Moments
by intotheyellowwoods
Summary: MO·ment: noun. A particular period of importance, influence, or significance in a series of events or developments: e.g, a great moment in history. There were 12 moments of these moments that defined Jace and Clary's relationship, spanning from City Of Bones to City Of Glass. To Jace, they were more precious than anything else. (EDITING, WILL REPLACE CHAPTERS AS UPDATED.)
1. Unrequited Love Confessions (EDITED)

**A/N: ******It's been almost two years since I finished ****_Moments_****, and it's still my most popular fanfiction, which I'm eternally grateful of. But to be honest... when I re-read it, I cringe a little. Over the past few years I've matured a lot as a writer, and****** I wanted to see if I could make it better.**

**For old fans of this fic, I will keep the original story up and just replace chapters as I go. Edited chapters will have (EDITED) beside the titles.**

**For newcomers, this will be a series of 12 moments that led to Jace and Clary's relationship. If you have any feedback or questions, don't be afraid to leave them in a PM or a review.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own the amazing Mortal Instruments series, nor am I Cassandra Clare. I also do not own most of the dialogue, either.**

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><p>Jace opened the door to the Java Jones and walked in, looking around carefully and scanning faces. It was easy to locate the redhead girl and her mundie friend, who sat at the far end of the small coffee shop, talking. He smiled smugly as he moved to sit on the couch behind them, feeling extremely satisfied with himself—really, it was almost too easy to spot her; it must have been her hair, that bright mop could be viewed from a mile away.<p>

Jace took one more look around the shop, surveying everyone, scanning for abnormalities. He was glamoured anyway, but it would've been nice to do _something_ productive. None of inhabitants of the little coffee shop seemed to be demons or known criminals, which was disappointing.

The only thing remotely interesting at all was the two mundies on stage—the first one, who was swaying on his feet beside the microphone, had the tips of his hair dyed a garish shade of pink. Jace choked back a snicker, thinking w_ell, _that's _masculine_. And it only got worse—the guy behind Pink Hair was beating mindlessly on some sort of drum and looked for all the world like he was high on faerie food.

Jace shook his head and tuned in to the redhead and the mundie's conversation, hoping in vain that it was much more interesting {spoiler alert: he was disappointed}.

"Don't look now, but that blond girl over there thinks you're cute," the redhead whispered, casting furtive looks at the girl in question, who was blonde and engrossed in some fashion magazine thing.

"The girl in the orange top?" The mundie responded, sounding bewildered.

Redhead nodded. "What makes you think so?" The mundie was still confused, apparently. _Mundies. _So dull.

Whatever Redhead was about to say was interrupted by a sharp burst of feedback from the microphone. She covered her ears as the boy with pink hair fought with it.

"Sorry about that, guys!" he yelled. "All right. I'm Eric, and this is my homeboy Matt on the drums. My first poem is called 'Untitled.'" Eric/Pink Hair screwed up his face as if he were in some sort of eternal torment, and wailed into the microphone, "come, my faux juggernaut, my nefarious loins! Slather every protuberance with arid zeal!"

The mundie in front of Jace slid down in his seat—the first wise decision he'd made thus far. "Please don't tell anyone I know him."

Redhead giggled into her palm. "Who uses the word 'loins'?"

"Eric," The mundie said grimly. Jace found himself agreeing with the mundie's attitude for the first time. "All his poems have loins in them."

"Turgid is my torment!" Pink Hair howled. "Agony swells within!"

"You bet it does," Redhead said. She slid down in her seat like the mundie beside her. "Anyway, about that girl who thinks you're cute."

"Never mind that for a second," the mundie interrupted. "There's something I wanted to talk to you about."

"Furious Mole is not a good name for a band," Redhead said quickly (and Jace rather agreed with her).

"Not that," The mundie replied, not even sounding the slightest bit irritated. Huh. "It's about what we were talking about before. About me not having a girlfriend."

Jace held back a snort as he realized where this conversation was heading. It looked like he might be wrong yet—the conversation could turn out to be interesting. "Oh." Redhead gave a one-shouldered shrug. "Oh, I don't know. Ask Jaida Jones out," she suggested. "She's nice, and she likes you."

"I don't want to ask Jaida Jones out."

"Why not?" Redhead snapped. "You don't like smart girls? Still seeking a rockin' bod?"

Jace held back a snort again. "Neither," said the agitated mundie, seemingly unconsciously ruffling a hand through his hair. "I don't want to ask her out because it wouldn't really be fair to her if I did..."

He trailed off as Redhead leaned forward. Jace knew the blond girl was doing the same. "Why not?"

"Because I like someone else," the mundie said.

"Okay," Redhead replied uncertainly. "You're not gay, are you?"

"If I were, I would dress better." (Jace agreed.)

"So, who is it, then?" Redhead demanded.

Maybe it was the wailing from the stage, but Jace was feeling a sort of pity for the mundie. Deciding that he'd seen enough, he coughed derisively to get Redhead's attention. Just as he'd planned, Redhead twisted around and saw him. Jace smirked at her tauntingly.

The mundie turned around as well, but Jace knew the mundie couldn't see him. "What is it?"

Redhead was still staring at him, so he raised a hand and waved, wiggling his fingers at her mockingly. Jace stood up and leisurely walked out the door, going over to lean against the alley wall. He started to fiddle with his Sensor out of boredom as he waited impatiently.

The redhead burst out of the coffee shop soon after, and Jace looked up at her. "Your friend's poetry is terrible," he told her.

Redhead blinked. "What?"

"I said his poetry was terrible. It sounds like he ate a dictionary and started vomiting up words at random."

"I don't care about Eric's poetry." The girl sounded furious. Hmm. It was easy to push her buttons. "I want to know why you're following me."

"Who said I was following you?"

"Nice try. And you were eavesdropping, too. Do you want to tell me what this is about, or should I just call the police?"

Jace almost laughed. "And tell them what?" he said disdainfully, cocking an eyebrow at her. "That invisible people are bothering you? Trust me, little girl, the police aren't going to arrest someone they can't see."

"I told you before, my name is not little girl," she said through her teeth. She really was easily angered. "It's Clary."

"I know," Jace answered. "Pretty name. Like the herb, clary sage. In the old days people thought eating the seeds would let you see the Fair Folk. Did you know that?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

Of course she wouldn't. "You don't know much, do you?" he said softly. It wasn't really the mundanes' fault, he supposed, but still. They didn't know anything. "You seem to be a mundane like any other mundane, yet you can see me. It's a conundrum."

"What's a mundane?" _Clary_ asked. She sounded confused again.

"Someone of the human world. Someone like you," Jace clarified, feeling a resigned kind of boredom. He supposed he would have to be the one to explain everything to her.

"But you're human," Clary said, still obviously bewildered. Jace wondered if all mundanes were this dumb.

"I am," he responded. "But I'm not like you." The words came out slightly resigned, as Jace didn't really give a damn if he believed her or not.

"You think you're better. That's why you were laughing at us."

"I was laughing at you because declarations of love amuse me, especially when unrequited," Jace retorted. "And because your Simon is one of the most mundane mundanes I've ever encountered. And because Hodge thought you might be dangerous, but if you are, you certainly don't know it."

"I'm dangerous?" Clary repeated, sounding astonished, backing away from him. "I saw you kill someone last night. I saw you drive a knife up under his ribs, and—" Clary cut off abruptly.

"I may be a killer," Jace responded, feeling annoyed at her accusation. She was making him out to be evil. "But I know what I am. Can you say the same?"

"I'm an ordinary human being, just like you said. Who's Hodge?"

"My tutor. And I wouldn't be so quick to brand myself as ordinary, if I were you." He leaned forward, trying not to look as interested as he was. "Let me see your right hand."

"My right hand?" Clary echoed, probably wondering what was so special about her right hand. Jace nodded slowly as if he was talking to a mentally ill person. "If I show you my hand, will you leave me alone?"

"Certainly," Jace lied, amusement clouding his voice (like he really would—for one, he would get in trouble, and for another…well, he wouldn't admit it out loud, but this girl sort of fascinated him).

Clary held out her right hand reluctantly, and Jace took it gently and turned it over. It was marked only by a dense cloud of freckles, but no Marks.

"Nothing." He was disappointed, more disappointed than he was about to show. He was Jace Lightwood, after all. He had a reputation to keep up. "You're not left-handed, are you?"

"No. Why?"

He released her hand, shrugging lazily. "Most Shadowhunter children get Marked on their right hands—or left, if they're left-handed like I am—when they're still young. It's a permanent rune that lends an extra skill with weapons." He showed her the back of his own left hand, knowing she probably couldn't see anything.

"I don't see anything," Clary said uncertainly, just like he'd thought.

"Let your mind relax," he recommended. "Wait for it to come to you. Like waiting for something to rise to the surface of water."

"You're crazy." But she relaxed anyways and gazed at his hand.

Suddenly, Clary looked startled, and Jace knew she'd seen it. She blinked, almost as if she thought she was seeing something that wasn't truly there. "A tattoo?"

He smiled in satisfaction and let his hand drop back to his side. "I thought you could do it. And it's not a tattoo, it's a Mark. They're runes, burned into our skin."

"They make you handle weapons better?" Clary sounded as if this was hard to believe.

"Different Marks do different things. Some are permanent, but the majority vanish when they've been used."

"That's why your arms aren't all inked up today?" she stated, her question not really a question. "Even when I concentrate?"

"That's exactly why," Jace answered, pleased that she was finally starting to understand. "I knew you had the Sight, at least." He glanced up at the darkening sky. "It's nearly full dark. We should go."

"We? I thought you were going to leave me alone."

"I lied," Jace said, not embarrassed in the least. "Hodge said I have to bring you to the Institute with me. He wants to talk to you."

"Why would he want to talk to me?"

"Because you know the truth now," Jace said, thinking this was fairly obvious and trying not to say '_duh'_. "There hasn't been a mundane who knew about us for at least a hundred years."

"About us?" she repeated. "You mean people like you. People who believe in demons."

"People who kill them," Jace corrected her, trying not to sound too withering. This girl just wouldn't get it, did she? "We're called Shadowhunters. At least, that's what we call ourselves. The Downworlders have less complimentary names for us."

"Downworlders?"

"The Night Children. Warlocks. The fey. The magical folk of this dimension," Jace explained idly, wondering how much time it would take to explain everything to her.

Clary shook her head. "Don't stop there—I suppose there are also, what, vampires and werewolves and zombies?"

Jace ignored her sarcastic tone. "Of course there are," he told her smoothly, "although you mostly find zombies farther south, where the voudun priests are."

"What about mummies? Do they only hang around Egypt?"

"Don't be ridiculous. No one believes in mummies."

"They don't?"

"Of course not," Jace said, not wanting to explain all of this or deal with her sass. "Look, Hodge will explain all this to you when you see him."

Clary crossed her arms over her chest. "What if I don't want to see him?"

"That's your problem. You can come either willingly or unwillingly."

Clary looked astounded, backing away again. She really was short. It was hard not to notice how much of a midget she was. "Are you threatening to kidnap me?"

"If you want to look at it that way," Jace said, trying not to smile, "then yes."

Clary opened her mouth angrily, but was interrupted by the strident buzzing noise of her phone ringing.

"Go ahead and answer that if you like," Jace said, deciding to be generous.

The phone stopped ringing and then started up again, loud and insistent. Clary frowned, turning away from Jace and beginning to dig through her bag. She found the phone and raised it to her ear. "Mom?"

Whatever the response was, it made Clary alarmed. "It's all right, Mom. I'm fine. I'm on my way home—"

"_No!_" The voice barely reached Jace's ears, tinny and distorted not only by the bad connection. "_Don't come home! Do you understand me, Clary? Don't you dare come home. Go to Simon's. Go straight to Simon's house and stay there until I can—"_ Some noise interrupted her, like the sound of something falling to the floor.

"Mom!" Clary yelled into the phone. "Mom, are you all right?"

The answering words were too faint for Jace to hear, but whatever they were was drowned out by a heavy crash like splintering wood.

"Who's found you? Mom, did you call the police? Did you—"

Clary was looking extremely terrified as Jace's mind spun. What was wrong? It was obvious that something was attacking her, but was it a demon, or a Downworlder? Was Clary's mom a Shadowhunter, or was this all mundane stuff?

"Mom!" Clary shrieked into the phone. "Mom, are you there?" She wretched the phone down from her ear, and glanced at the screen anxiously.

"Clary," Jace asked, feeling strangely concerned for her. (How odd.) "What's going on?"

Clary ignored him. She kept pounding upon a button on her phone feverishly, her hands shaking. He watched her with an almost clinical type of interest as she failed to redial and the phone slipped out of her hand and hit the pavement. It was cracked and dead when she bent down to retrieve it. She looked as if she was going to cry as she swore and threw the phone back onto the pavement.

"Stop that." Jace hauled her to her feet steadily, his hand gripping her wrist. "Has something happened?"

"Give me your phone," Clary demanded, grabbing Sensor out of his pocket. "I have to—"

"It's not a phone," Jace said, though he didn't try to get it back. Whoever this girl was, he knew she'd lash out at him and only end up hurting herself. "It's a Sensor. You won't be able to use it."

"But I need to call the police!"

"Tell me what happened first." She tried to pull her wrist back, but Jace held firm. "I can help you."

Clary turned livid, and she struck out at Jace's face, scratching her nails across his cheek. Jace jerked back in surprise and shock (he hadn't thought she would do that), and in that moment, she tore herself free and ran out into the street.

Jace sighed resignedly. _Why did they always have to run?_ He thought, running a hand across his abused cheek. He knew that he had to protect Clary, not just for the Clave's reasons but for his own currently indistinguishable reasons as well. Shaking his head and turning on his heel, Jace followed after her into the darkness.

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><p><strong>Feel free to drop me a review telling me what you liked or didn't like! Any type of feedback is good feedback.<strong>

**~dontforget2live (aka Alex) :) x**

**P.S. Shameless plug time: I have a tumblr, and I think it's pretty cool. My url is abundantmetaphoricalresonances if you want to check it out.**


	2. Bedtime Stories (EDITED)

**A/N: Hello again! I've decided on a schedule for this: updates will be every week on Sunday. **

**Also, I've realized that uploading this is weird and awkward. If you have me on Author Alert (or you're following me or whatever they call it now), then you're probably gonna get a notification of this being a thirteenth chapter, which I then change to the correct chapter, which in turn breaks the link in the notification email. I do this is because if I just replace the chapter, then you won't get the notification and nobody will know it's edited. I'm not quite sure how to change this or make it easier for all of us, so if anyone has any ideas, they would be much appreciated. :)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of this, and I am not Cassandra Clare.**

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><p><strong><strong>I'd also like to thank everyone who has favoritedsubscribed to/reviewed this story so far. I should probably also reply to** the people who left reviews in the previous chapter (which I'll be doing from hereon out):**

**to bubbleawesomeness: Thank you!**

**to To Love Is To Destroy: Thanks so much! I like your username, by the way :)**

**to ILove2Write13: Thank you! I'll try :)**

**to the ticking clock: Thank you so much! I'm really trying to capture Jace's sassiness and wit, so that's nice to hear.**

****to Ada: Everyone has their own opinions, and I'm a big believer in freedom of belief, so I'm not going to get mad at you. I will give you a small explanation: this book is literally scenes from the book, translated into Jace's POV. So there should be some similarities. But I've tried - especially with this edit - to make it a bit different.****

****to Jane-evelyn-Doe17: Thank you!****

****to dianscot: Thank you! I kind of enjoyed writing that chapter because of Jace's attitude in it. And yeah, I've realized that it doesn't match, but I just wasn't really sure where to put that part it, so...****

****to White Dusk8888: Thank you so much! I hope you enjoy the rest of the story :)****

**to Divya the Fangirl: Haha, yeah. Not yet, but it'll happen eventually. *pats Jace on the head consolingly***

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><p>Jace couldn't yet pin what it was, but something about Clary intrigued him. She was different than most girls he'd met; Clary wasn't always perfect. She had faults, but to Jace they were endearing. Clary was like Isabelle: tough on the outside, but on the inside oddly fragile. At the same time, though, Clary was different then Isabelle, because Clary wouldn't mind if she got her clothes dirty.<p>

Jace snorted. He was in Clary's room now, for no particular reason. It was almost borderline stalker-ish to be in the room belonging to the girl who you might have a crush on—

Jace shook his head. He did _not _just think that—that was _not_ a Jace Thing to think. Jace Wayland did not have feelings for girls he just met. He was turning soft, losing his touch. Frantically, he looked around the room to find something to distract himself with, and found it in the form of her sketchbook, innocuously lying open on her bed.

Jace walked over and looked at her most recent sketch. It was of Simon, looking out on the porch of what Jace supposed was his house (it wasn't Clary's). Clary was skilled at drawing, and he had to admit that even though the drawing was of Simon the Mundie, it was excellent. Feeling curious, he flipped farther through the sketchbook, pausing briefly look at each drawing. All of them were good, and most of them were excellent.

The door opened, and Clary entered her room to see Jace. With a little shriek, she dropped a vial that was in her hand; apparently, it had been open, because green liquid spread steadily over the floor.

"Oh, dear," he said, sitting up. "I hope that wasn't anything important."

"It was a sleeping potion," Clary responded irritably, touching the tip of her sneaker to the mess. "And now it's gone."

"If only Simon were here. He could probably bore you to sleep."

Clary sat down on the bed and picked up her abandoned sketchbook. "I don't usually let people look at this," she said softly.

"Why not?" Jace responded, looking down at her. "You're a pretty good artist. Sometimes even excellent."

"Well, because—it's like a diary. Except I don't think in words, I think in pictures, so it's all drawings. But it's still private," Clary explained, trailing off a bit at the end.

Jace molded a wounded look onto his face. "A diary with no drawings of me in it? Where are the torrid fantasies? The romance novel covers? The—"

"Do all the girls you meet fall in love with you?" Clary asked quietly.

Jace was so surprised at her question that he dropped his façade and paused. "It's not love," he speculated, his voice suddenly turning soft. "At least—"

"You could try not being charming all the time," Clary said. There was a hard edge in her voice that felt a knife to Jace. "It might be a relief for everyone."

Jace looked down at his hands to hide the peculiar sinking feeling he felt. "If you're really tired, I could put you to sleep," he offered, changing the subject carefully. "Tell you a bedtime story."

She looked up at him, surprised. "Are you serious?"

"I'm always serious," Jace retorted, smiling inwardly. Obviously, Clary thought that his mind had been affected. But almost as soon as the amusement came, it was gone. He knew the story he would tell like the pain of an old wound.

Clary put the sketchbook down on the nightstand and lay down, curling up cutely on the pillow. "Okay," she agreed softly.

"Close your eyes."

Clary closed them obediently.

"Once there was a boy," Jace started.

Clary, forever the impatient one, interrupted him almost immediately. "A Shadowhunter boy?"

"Of course." For a moment he was faintly amused again, but it passed as quickly as the last time.

"When the boy was six, years old, his father gave him a falcon to train. Falcons are raptors—killing birds, his father told him, the Shadowhunters of the sky. The falcon didn't like the boy, and the boy didn't like it, either. Its sharp beak made him nervous, and its bright eyes always seemed to be watching him. It would slash at him with beak and talons when he came near: for weeks his wrists and hands were always bleeding. He didn't know it, but his father had selected a falcon that had lived in the wild for over a year, and thus was nearly impossible to tame. But the boy tried, because his father had told him to make the falcon obedient, and he wanted to please his father.

"He stayed with the falcon constantly, keeping it awake by talking to it and even playing music to it, because a tired bird was meant to be easier to tame. He learned the equipment: the jesses, the hood, the brail, the leash that bound the bird to his wrist. He was meant to keep the falcon blind, but he couldn't bring himself to do it—instead he tried to sit where the bird could see him as he touched and stroked its wings, willing it to trust him. He fed it from his hand, and at first it would not eat. Later it ate so savagely that its beak cut the skin of his palm. But the boy was glad, because it was progress, and because he wanted the bird to know him, even if the bird had to consume his blood to make that happen.

"He began to see that the falcon was beautiful, that its slim wings were built for the speed of flight, that it was strong and swift, fierce and gentle. When it dived to the ground, it moved like light. When it learned to circle and come to his wrist, he nearly shouted with delight. Sometimes the bird would hop to his shoulder and put its beak in his hair. He knew his falcon loved him, and when he was certain it was not just tamed but perfectly tamed, he went to his father and showed him what he had done, expecting him to be proud.

"Instead his father took the bird, now tame and trusting, in his hands and broke its neck. 'I told you to make it obedient,' his father said, and dropped the falcon's lifeless body to the ground. 'Instead, you taught it to love you. Falcons are not meant to be loving pets: They are fierce and wild, savage and cruel. This bird was not tamed; it was broken.'

"Later, when his father left him, the boy cried over his pet, until eventually his father sent a servant to take the body of the bird away and bury it. The boy never cried again, and he never forgot what he'd learned: that to love is to destroy, and that to be loved is to be the one destroyed."

Clary had been lying still and hardly making a sound through Jace's entire story, but she rolled clumsily onto her back at the end of it. "That's an awful story," she informed him indignantly, opening up her green eyes. Her lips were set in an awful pout that Jace most definitely did not find cute. He swore he didn't. Nope. Not at all.

Jace thought she might be right, though. "Is it?" he asked her thoughtfully.

"The boy's father is horrible. It's a story about child abuse. I should have known that's what Shadowhunters think a bedtime story is like. Anything that gives you screaming nightmares—"

"Sometimes the Marks can give you screaming nightmares," Jace told her. "If you get them when you're too young." (He'd gotten them too young.) All the same, he looked at Clary pensively; maybe she was right, maybe his father was harsh. "It's a good story if you think about it," he said. "The boy's father is just trying to make him stronger. Inflexible."

"But you have to learn to bend a little," Clary yawned. Apparently, even though the content of the story had scared her, the story had done its job. "Or you'll break."

"Not if you're strong enough," Jace said decisively. After a moment's debate, he hesitantly reached the back of his hand out and gently brushed it along her cheekbone. Clary was peaceful in her half-awake state, and much prettier. He watched as she succumbed to sleep.

Jace thought she had whispered his name, but when he bent down, she was fast asleep. He reached out his hand again and brushed a few strands of her candy-red hair away from her face. With a smile, Jace left the room.

He was in deep.

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><p><strong>Is anyone else aww-ing? Because I definitely am.<strong>

**Also, friendly reminder that reviews are much appreciated ;)**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	3. Pins (EDITED)

**A/N: Hello again! Here's a short chapter for you, set right before Magnus Bane's party. Sorry I didn't post yesterday; a**** family thing came up suddenly... and yeah.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own The Mortal Instruments series.**

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><p><strong>to To Love Is To Destroy: Thank you! And yes, it's super duper cute. I may or may not have been fangirling while writing it.<strong>

**to Region and District: Thanks so much! There's more chapters up now if you want to read them :)**

**To Green Adventurer: Thanks! It's one of mine too.**

**To dianscot: Thank you :)**

**to MilliniumLint: so was I :) (and thanks!)**

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><p>Jace tapped his foot impatiently against the floor of the Institute's entryway. Why did it take girls so long to get ready?<p>

Alec shifted against the wall beside him in boredom. Even Simon the Geek looked bored and slightly uncomfortable. _Well, he _should _feel uncomfortable, _Jace thought nastily, and immediately, a small voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like Clary chided him for making fun of her best friend.

Jace snorted. Once again, his thoughts had strayed back to Clary. After he'd gotten to know the girl, he'd found that he really liked her. Probably in ways that he shouldn't, but some things couldn't be helped.

_To love is to destroy, _Jace reminded himself for the millionth time, just as the sharp _clack_ of high heels on tile sounded from the hallway as Isabelle and Clary _finally _came into the entryway.

Jace's mouth went dry at the sight of Clary. She'd always been pretty to him, but now she looked breathtaking. The black dress she was wearing was short enough to show enough leg to make Jace's mouth water, and her hair was pulled back by some fancy pins. Clary's face was angular, her green eyes standing out and her lips glossed and kissable.

Jace watched as Simon stood up straight. "What is _that_?" Simon demanded. "That you're wearing, I mean." Jace felt anger surge up in him as he noticed that the other boy was staring at Clary's legs.

"It's a dress, Simon," Clary responded dryly. "I know I don't wear them that much, but really."

"It's so short." The mundie was confused.

Jace unhitched himself from the wall. "I like the dress," he said, eyes raking up and down her body in an almost lazy way. "It needs a little something extra, though."

"So now you're a fashion expert?" It might've just been his imagination, but Jace thought that Clary's voice grew slightly uneven as he moved closer.

Jace pulled the dagger out of his pocket and handed it to her wordlessly. Clary looked at it with a little bit of panic.

She shook her head quickly. "I wouldn't even know how to use that—"

Jace pressed the sheathed dagger into her hand, and curled her fingers over it. "You'd learn." He lowered his voice. "It's in your blood."

Clary slowly drew her hand back. "All right."

"I could give you a thigh sheath to put that in," Isabelle offered. "I've got tons."

"CERTAINLY _NOT_," Simon said immediately.

Clary looked at Simon with all the irritation that Jace felt. "Thanks, but I'm not really a thigh sheath kind of girl." (Jace somewhat wished she was.)

She carefully slid the dagger into a pocket in her backpack.

Jace was still watching her. "And one last thing," he said, before reaching over and pulling the pins out of her hair so it fell down around her shoulders.

"Much better." (And he knew his voice was slightly uneven too.)

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><p><strong>Am I the only one fangirling?<strong>

**Please leave a review if you liked this chapter!**

**~Alex(aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	4. Birthday Celebrations (EDITED)

**A/N: So here is the next chapter. I think it's my favourite thus far - read it and try and guess why, haha (spoiler alert: it's the Clace moment). **

**Disclaimer: I don't own TMI. Cassandra Clare does.**

**(Also: have any of you read City of Heavenly Fire yet? I haven't (so please don't give me any spoilers), but I'm curious to know what you thought of it.)**

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><p><strong>to To Love Is To Destroy: Thank you! Awwing seems to be a side effect of Clace fluff.<strong>

**to Region and District: Thank you! Awwing is contagious.**

**to the ticking clock: Thanks! I really like writing from Jace's point of view - in fact, I think everything I've written for the TMI fandom has been from his POV.**

**to dianscot: Thank you! Yeah, I'd imagine Jace would like the idea of Clary with a thigh sheath. The line's added :)**

**to LucianDaughterofHades: Thanks! It's one of mine, too.**

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><p>Jace smirked smugly as he walked down to the residence wing. So far, his plan had gone perfectly—he'd stolen the apples form Izzy and had slipped Clary's present into his pocket. Now, all he had to do was get the red-haired beauty herself.<p>

Clary's door came into view, and instead of barging in as he'd normally do, Jace decided to be polite and knock on the door, figuring that it would keep her in a better mood. The doorknob turned only a moment later and Clary stood on the other side, her hair mushed flat on one side and looking tired.

"Were you asleep?" Jace asked, curiosity coloring his voice.

"No." Clary opened the door wider and treaded out into the dim corridor. "Why would you think that?"

Jace looked over her blue and slightly revealing (not that he minded) pajama set. "No reason."

"I was in bed most of the day," she said, sounding slightly nervous. "What about you? Aren't you exhausted?"

He shook his head. "Much like the postal service, demon hunters never sleep. 'Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these—'"

"You'd be in major trouble if gloom of night did stay you," Clary felt the need to point out. Jace grinned at her teasingly.

Clary gripped her elbows as if she was starting to get cold. "What are you doing here, anyway?" She asked, changing the subject. Jace smiled inwardly.

"'Here' as in your bedroom or 'here' as in the great spiritual question of our purpose here on this planet? If you're asking whether it's all just a cosmic coincidence or there's a greater meta-ethical purpose to life, well, that's a puzzler for the ages. I mean, simple ontological reductionism is clearly a fallacious argument, but—"

"I'm going back to bed." Clary reached for the doorknob, but Jace couldn't let her leave until her birthday was celebrated. He quickly slid between the door and her petite body. "I'm _here_," he started, "because Hodge reminded me it was your birthday."

Clary exhaled. She sounded exasperated, as if she'd been saying this to people for all time. "Not until tomorrow."

"That's no reason not to start celebrating now."

She looked at him warily. "You're avoiding Alec and Isabelle."

Jace nodded. "Both of them are trying to pick fights with me."

"For the same reason?"

"I couldn't tell." He glanced surreptitiously around the hallway. "Hodge, too. Everyone wants to talk to me. Except you. I bet you don't want to talk to me."

"No," Clary confirmed. "I want to eat. I'm starving."

Jace brought his hand out from behind his back and showed her the bag. "I snuck some food from the kitchen when Isabelle wasn't looking."

Clary grinned widely. It made her whole face light up, and Jace swallow and look away. "A picnic? It's a little late for Central Park, don't you think? It's full of—"

He waved a hand, cutting her off. "Faeries. I know."

"I was going to say muggers," Clary retorted, glancing at him in what seemed to be a subconscious manner. "Though I pity the mugger who goes after you."

"That is a wise attitude, and I commend you for it," said Jace, feeling appreciative. There was nothing that he liked more and came less rarely than ego boosts, as Isabelle and Alec had both learned not to compliment him or risk having his ego turn supernova. "But I wasn't thinking of Central Park. How about the greenhouse?"

"Now? At night? Won't it be dark?"

Jace smiled cryptically, not wanting to tell her yet. "Come on. I'll show you."

Jace led the familiar way up to the greenhouse, not taking any note or interest in the many empty rooms. The walk was over five minutes long, but he kept himself busy by sneaking looks at Clary. Her fiery hair shone with copper tints in the moonlight, curling freely in what could only be described as a mane of hair, every single curl as stubborn as the person whose body they belonged to. Jace wondered what it would be like to run his hands through that hair, feel the curls straighten out and then _boing _back into place like liquid fire—

Jace shook his head and clenched his hands at his sides; he couldn't let his thoughts run astray like that. Clary didn't like him that way. And to love is to destroy, after all. And Clary was too perfect to be destroyed.

Jace opened the greenhouse door quickly for Clary and stepped in after her. She seemed taken in by the sights in front of them, glancing everywhere from the view to Manhattan and the flowers.

"Wow." She spun around slowly, taking everything in in awe. Her coral-tinted mouth had dropped open in a small _o _without her noticing. Jace swallowed. "It's so beautiful here at night."

He smiled down at her. "And we have the place to ourselves. Alec and Isabelle hate it up here. They have allergies."

Clary shivered, though Jace wasn't completely sure that it was because she was cold. "What kind of flowers are these?"

He shrugged and sat down carefully next to the Midnight Flower. If he broke anything, Hodge would kill him. "No idea. You think I pay attention in botany class? I'm not going to be an archivist. I don't need to know about that stuff."

"You just need to know how to kill things?"

Jace looked up at her and smiled mischievously. "That's right." He took paper-wrapped sandwich out of the back. "Also, I make a mean cheese sandwich. Try one."

Clary smiled grudgingly and sat down across from him. He pulled the apples, a bar of some fancy chocolate, and a bottle of water out of the bag. "Not a bad haul," she said, sounding approving.

He then produced the long bone-handled knife that Isabelle had threatened him with earlier. He picked up the apple and quickly cut them into eighths. "Well, it's not birthday cake," he answered, handing her a piece just as a strange and very out-of-character nervousness. "But hopefully it's better than nothing."

"Nothing is what I was expecting, so thanks." Clary took a bite of the apple.

"Nobody should get nothing on their birthday." Jace gave the second apple the same treatment and also cut it into eights. "Birthdays should be special. My birthday was always the one day my father said I could do or have anything I wanted."

"Anything?" She laughed. "Like what kind of anything did you want?"

"Well, when I was five, I wanted to take a bath in spaghetti."

"But he didn't let you, right?"

"No, that's the thing. He did. He said it wasn't expensive, and why not if that was what I wanted? He had the servants fill a bath with boiling water and pasta, and when it cooled down ..." Jace shrugged casually. It was funny (or kind of scary, depending how you looked at it) how easily the words flowed around Clary. "I took a bath in it."

Clary looked incredulous. "How was it?"

"Slippery."

"I'll bet." It looked as if Clary was trying to picture it, but couldn't. "What else did you ask for?"

"Weapons, mostly," Jace responded, his mouth quirking up slightly. "Which I'm sure doesn't surprise you. Books. I read a lot on my own."

"You didn't go to school?"

"No," Jace answered her cautiously. He didn't want to talk about his past with Clary.

"But your friends—"

"I didn't have friends," he countered shortly. "Besides my father. He was all I needed."

Clary stared at him as if he were speaking Martian. "No friends at all?"

Jace stared back. "The first time I saw Alec," he replied, "when I was ten years old, that was the first time I'd ever met another child my own age. The first time I had a friend."

She dropped her gaze, a pink tinge appearing on her cheekbones.

"Don't feel sorry for me," Jace responded; it was clear what she was thinking. "He gave me the best education, the best training. He took me all over the world. London. Saint Petersburg. Egypt. We used to love to travel." His eyes were dark. "I haven't been anywhere since he died. Nowhere but New York."

"You're lucky," Clary told him, looking morose. "I've never been outside this state in my life. My mom wouldn't even let me go on field trips to D.C. I guess I know why now," she added, sounding melancholy.

"She was afraid you'd freak out? Start seeing demons in the White House?"

She nibbled a piece of chocolate. "There are demons in the White House?"

"I was kidding," Jace told her. He almost laughing at her surprised expression, but wisely refrained. "I think." He shrugged non-commitantly. "I'm sure someone would have mentioned it."

"I think she just didn't want me to get too far away from her. My mom, I mean. After my dad died, she changed a lot."

He raise an eyebrow at her. "Do you remember your father?"

She shook her head, still looking sad. "No. He died before I was born."

"You're lucky," Jace told her darkly. "That way you don't miss him."

"Does it go away?" Clary asked him. "Missing him, I mean?"

Jace glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, but didn't answer. "Are you thinking of your mother?"

"Of Luke, actually."

"Not that that's actually his name." He thought it best to tell Clary what he was thinking. "I've been thinking about him. Something about his behavior doesn't add up—"

"He's a coward," Clary responded bitterly. "You heard him. He won't go against Valentine. Not even for my mother."

"But that's exactly—" The bell tower struck midnight and interrupted him. "Midnight," he said aloud, putting the knife down hastily before getting to his feet. He offered a sticky hand to Clary and pulled her up. "Now, watch."

He directed his gaze to the Midnight Flower. Clary was obviously still confused, and started to ask him what she was supposed to be looking at, but Jace merely held up a hand to stop her. "Wait," he cautioned, trying to not sound too eager.

All of the sudden, one of the tightly closed buds began to shake. It swelled to double its size and split open. The many petals were dusted with pale gold pollen, luminous in the moonlight like the petals themselves were embedded with thousands of tiny stars.

"Oh!" said Clary, and looked up to meet Jace's gaze. She smiled up at him, her fingers twitching around an invisible pencil. "Do they bloom every night?"

"Only at midnight," Jace said softly, wondering if she'd come back to sketch the plant. He'd never seen her actually draw anything before; he might have to take more frequent midnight trips up to the greenhouse if that were the case. "Happy birthday, Clarissa Fray."

Clary looked touched, as if no one had ever done something like this for her before. "Thank you."

Jace cleared his throat inconspicuously. "I have something for you," Jace said, barely keeping the nervous quaver from his voice. He dug around in his pocket and brought out the rune-stone, pressing it into her hand.

"Huh," said Clary, looking it over as if he'd given her space rock. "You know, when most girls say they want a big rock, they don't mean, you know, _literally_ a big rock."

"Very amusing, my sarcastic friend. It's not a rock, precisely. All Shadowhunters have a witchlight rune-stone."

"Oh." She looked at it with more interest, and closed her fingers around it experimentally. Apparently, she was a quick study; small beams of light filtered through her fingers.

"It will bring you light," Jace told her quietly, thinking _although_ _you already have enough light yourself._ "Even among the darkest shadows of this world and others."

Clary slipped the rune-stone into the pocket of her shorts. "Well, thanks. It was nice of you to give me anything." (She must've felt the tension, too.) "Better than a bath in spaghetti any day."

He smacked himself mentally. "If you share that little bit of personal information with anyone, I may have to kill you," he told her darkly.

"Well, when I was five, I wanted my mother to let me go around and around inside the dryer with the clothes." Clary was clearly trying to make him feel better. "The difference is, she didn't let me."

"Probably because going around and around inside a dryer can be fatal," Jace told her, smiling slightly. "Whereas pasta is rarely fatal. Unless Isabelle makes it."

The midnight flower was already shedding petals. They drifted toward the floor, glimmering like slivers of starlight. "When I was twelve, I wanted a tattoo," Clary told him melodiously. Apparently, she was also having trouble keeping her words in. "My mom wouldn't let me have that, either."

It did make sense. "Most Shadowhunters get their first Marks at twelve. It must have been in your blood."

"Maybe. Although I doubt most Shadowhunters get a tattoo of Donatello from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on their left shoulder."

Jace felt puzzled. He didn't understand many of the mundane references that Clary or the mundie spewed out, but this one in particular _really _made no sense. "You wanted a turtle on your shoulder?"

"I wanted to cover my chicken pox scar," she explained, pulling the strap of her top aside slightly, exposing tantalizingly bare skin and a white scar identical to his. "See?"

He looked away before he couldn't control himself from kissing her right then and there. _By the _Angel_, Jace, it's just an arm. _But it wasn't just an arm—it was Clary. Beautiful Clary. _I really like you, _he wanted to say. _I really like you, and I really want to kiss you until your head spins and you're breathing out my name, but hey. No big deal. _"It's getting late," he said instead. "We should go back downstairs."

Clary pulled her strap back up. There was a distinct air of awkwardness about them as they moved slowly towards the door.

"Have you and Isabelle ever—dated?" Clary suddenly blurted out.

Jace stopped in his tracks and looked back at her, his eyes widening slightly. "Isabelle?" He repeated vacantly.

"I thought—" Now the air was even more awkward. "Simon was wondering."

"Maybe _he_ should ask her."

"I'm not sure he wants to," Clary told him frankly. "Anyway, never mind. It's none of my business."

Jace smiled uneasily at her. _Isabelle? _Sure, Isabelle was beautiful, if Jace really thought about it, but she wasn't really his type (turns out, his type was redheaded fiery girls named Clary). "The answer is no. I mean, there may have been a time when one or the other of us considered it, but she's almost a sister to me. It would be strange."

"You mean Isabelle and you never—"

"Never," Jace repeated.

"She hates me," Clary confessed.

"No, she doesn't," Jace told her, to both their surprise. "You just make her nervous, because she's always been the only girl in a crowd of adoring boys, and now she isn't anymore."

"But she's so beautiful."

"So are you," Jace said, and without thinking about it, the words had slipped out of his mouth without his consent. "And very different from how she is, and she can't help but notice that. She's always wanted to be small and delicate, you know. She hates being taller than most boys."

Jace felt awkward. He wanted to hide in one of the many rooms of the Institute and never appear again, but he couldn't. He was a Shadowhunter, and Shadowhunters were brave (well, most of the time).

Clary continued to stare at him. "We should probably go downstairs," Jace suggested again.

"All right," she agreed after a long pause, and she started to walk towards the door, Jace at her heels. But there was a glint of metal on the floor and as Clary jerked sideways to avoid it, she lost her balance, her shoulder bumping against Jace's. And when he reached out to steady her and she turned towards him to apologize, somehow Jace's arm was around her and he was kissing her.

Jace was rigid with shock. The one thing that Jace had always prided himself on was his ability to control his emotions, but he _couldn't stop kissing her_. She tasted like the apples they had eaten before, and Jace gave in, wrapping both arms around her and pulling her flush against him. He'd always thought Clary delicate, in a way, but right then she was not delicate at all—she was a siren, the worst kind of seductress, her hands fisted in Jace's hair and every line of her body pressed against him, gasping against his mouth, being entirely too beautiful and dangerous to exist. She was the kind of creature that made Jace want to forget the world, and for one blissful moment, nothing else mattered to him but the feel of his hands cupping the sides of her waist—

A rushing sound slowly made itself known; the sound was uncannily similar to beating wings. The lines managed to connect in Jace's head and he pulled his mouth off Clary's with a muttered curse. His arms were still around her, holding her against him as his eyes fixed on the black bird behind them. "Don't panic, but we've got an audience."

Clary turned her head around and spotted Hugo up in a tree behind them. Her eyes were a dark emerald, blown wide at the pupils, her cheeks flushed red. Entirely too beautiful.

"If he's here, Hodge won't be far behind," Jace said in an undertone. "We should go."

"Is he spying on you?" Clary hissed back. "Hodge, I mean."

"No. He just likes to come up here to think. Too bad—we were having such a scintillating conversation." Jace laughed noiselessly.

They made their way back to Clary's room, hands joined. He wasn't quite sure how it had happened, but Jace felt a kind of pleasant fire in the hand holding hers.

In too short a time, they reached her door. Clary leaned her body against the wall beside it and looked up, smiling up at him. "Thanks for the birthday picnic," she said, trying to keep her tone neutral.

Jace was feeling rather unwilling to let her hand go. "Are you going to sleep?"

"Aren't you tired?"

"I've never been more awake," Jace answered her honestly. His voice was low as he leaned over to kiss her, cupping her face with his other hand. The kiss had started out chastely, but deepened quickly, just getting deeper and more passionate when—

The door banged open and the mundie stepped out. His hair was flattened to one side and he wasn't wearing his geeky glasses. "What the hell?" His voice was so loud and angry, so raucous and ringing that Clary leapt away from Jace.

"Simon! What are you—I mean, I thought you were—"

"Asleep? I was," he told her. His cheeks were an angry tomato red that didn't suit him at all. "Then I woke up and you weren't there, so I thought..."

Clary looked speechless. Jace was starting to feel a kind of fury towards the mundie, and even slight anger towards Clary. Were they together? Why was she acting so ashamed? Was it because of him?

"I'm sorry," the redhead in question said.

Jace looked at her with pure, unhidden rage. _She shouldn't be apologizing! She doesn't need to apologize for anything except her idiocy!_

Jace molded his usual look onto his face easily to hide his emotions.

"In future, Clarissa," he told her, a mocking edge to his voice. It was a blade without a handle: it cut him just as much as it must have hurt her. "It might be wise to mention that you already have a man in your bed, to avoid such tedious situations."

"You invited him into bed?" Simon demanded, looking thoroughly nauseated at the thought.

"Ridiculous, isn't it?" Jace asked him cuttingly. "We would never have all fit."

"I didn't invite him into bed," Clary yelled at them both. "We were just kissing!"

"Just kissing?" Jace wove false hurt into his voice. "How swiftly you dismiss our love."

"Jace..." Clary looked up to meet the malice in Jace's eyes and trailed off.

"Simon, it's late," she said, sounding mentally exhausted. "I'm sorry we woke you up."

"So am I." He stalked back into the room and slammed the door behind him.

Jace molded a bland, insincere smile onto his face and prepared to say the words that would cut her most. "Go on, go after him. Pat his head and tell him he's still your super special little guy. Isn't that what you want to do?"

God, he was an ass. But he couldn't stop being one. "Stop it," Clary demanded, sounding shaky. "Stop being like that."

Jace's smile widened bitterly. "Like what?"

"If you're angry, just say it. Don't act like nothing ever touches you. It's like you never feel anything at all."

"Maybe you should have thought about that before you kissed me," he said.

Clary glanced at him disbelievingly. "_I_ kissed _you_?"

Jace looked back at her with bright malice. "Don't worry," he assured her. "It wasn't that memorable for me, either." Lie. It was the only kiss that he'd ever really remember.

Jace walked away angrily, and vaguely heard Clary slam the door.

As soon as he reached his bedroom, Jace ripped the door open and walked in, kicking it shut behind him.

The image of Clary came into his mind. _"Go on, go after him. Pat his head and tell him he's still your super special little guy. Isn't that what you want to do?"_

Jace slammed his fist into the wall, leaving an angry hand-shaped hole in the wall. When pain rose over the anger, Jace slid down to the floor ad leaned his head against the wall.

(To love is to destroy. And he'd been hell-bent on destroying her, hadn't he?)

Jace knew he wasn't supposed to feel this way. Jace Wayland _never _felt this way about a girl. Hell, he never really _cared _this much about a girl—

Jace stopped and groaned, putting his face in his hands. There, that was it: he, Jace Wayland, was in love with Clarissa Fray.

_Great._

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><p><strong><strong>So I really hate to sound whiny, but I haven't gotten any reviews on the edited chapters. Normally that wouldn't be a big deal, but when I first pitched the idea of editing this fic I had a lot of support for it and now that I've actually started re-posting, I haven't gotten any feedback at all. I do sound kinda whiny, don't I? But I just want to know if you guys want me to keep editing or not. So please leave a review if you liked it.<strong>**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) xx**


	5. Siblings (EDITED)

**A/N: This marks the end of the City Of Bones chapters! From now on, it's going to be about 90% angst.**

**Disclaimer: I am not the amazing Cassandra Clare, and I do not own the Mortal Instruments series.**

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><p><strong>to To Love Is To Destroy: Thanks! This was one of my favourite chapters to write.<strong>

**to xBlownxAwayx: Thank you! Don't worry, I'm definitely going to continue this :)**

**to the tickingclock: Thank you so much! I really tried to work hard at that. I hope you'll like the edited version even better.**

**to Jane-evelyn-Doe17: Thanks!**

**to zaregirl13: Thank you! Glad to be of service :)**

**to dianscot: Yeah, I've read Cassandra Clare's version. Thanks - it's a huge compliment for you to say that to me :)**

**to WhiteDusk8888: Thank you! I'm really trying to make them act that way.**

**to tobestardust: Thank you so much! I'm literally blushing. I really hope you like the rest :)**

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><p>Jace sighed and moved over to stand by the window. Everything had changed so much in the past twenty-four hours; he had found that his father was still alive, and that his father was Valentine.<p>

(That was hard to believe, but Jace believed it. Somehow he'd guessed it before, but had always dismissed it.)

A voice suddenly sounded out from behind him, a familiar voice that belonged to a familiar redhead. "Jace," Clary called, voice cracking slightly at the end with relief. Jace turned, the curtain falling out of his hands without him noticing it. _Clary _was here, and she had come for him.

"Jace!" Clary repeated, voice soft. She ran towards Jace, and he caught her as she hurled herself at him, wrapping his arms tightly around her.

"Clary," he whispered, almost reverently, "Clary, what are you doing here?"

"I came for you," she replied, voice muffled against his chest.

"You shouldn't have." Jace loosened his grip and stepped back to look at her properly. "My God," he said, touching her face. "You idiot, what a thing to do."

Jace was irrationally frustrated because she could have gotten hurt, could have died. But not angry, never angry—he could never be angry at Clary. He brushed her hair back like he had that day that he told her about his falcon. "Why don't you ever think?"

"I was thinking," she said quietly, looking down. "I was thinking about you."

He closed his eyes for a moment, trying not to kiss her then and there. "If anything had happened to you..." He traced down her arms lightly, reassuring himself that this was in fact Clary, the whole, alive Clary. "How did you find me?"

"Luke," she told him, smiling slightly. "I came with Luke. To rescue you."

Jace frowned. "So those are—you came with the wolf clan?" he asked, still upset that she had come all this way for nothing.

"Luke's," she answered him. "He's a werewolf, and—"

"I know," Jace cut her off, glancing at the ornate door behind them. "I should have guessed—the manacles. Where is he?"

"Downstairs," said Clary slowly. "He killed Blackwell. I came up to look for you—"

"He's going to have to call them off," Jace said gently.

She looked at him, not comprehending. "What?"

"Luke," Jace clarified gently. He could understand her slowness in this situation; after all, it had taken him a while, too. "He's going to have to call off his pack. There's been a misunderstanding."

"What, you kidnapped yourself?" Clary had probably meant it as a joke, but her voice was too anxious to pull it off. "Come _on_, Jace."

She pulled at his wrist, but he stayed still, staring at her fixedly, trying to silently convey his thoughts to her.

"Are those your clothes?" Clary sounded bewildered. "And—you're all bandaged up..." Clary trailed off as suspicion hit. "Valentine seems to be taking awfully good care of you."

He smiled at her. If he didn't love her, he would be thoroughly pissed by now. "If I told you the truth, you'd say I was crazy."

"No, I wouldn't."

"My father gave me these clothes." Jace hesitated before speaking the words.

Clary obviously didn't believe him. "Jace," she said slowly, as if he was a bomb about to blow up if she said the wrong thing. "Your father is dead."

"No." Jace shook his head and tried to hold back his emotions. "I thought he was, but he isn't. It's all been a mistake."

"Is this something Valentine told you? Because he's a liar, Jace. Remember what Hodge said. If he's telling you your father is alive, it's a lie to get you to do what he wants."

"I've seen my father." Jace was frustrated at her for not believing him now. "I've talked to him. He gave me this."

He pulled at his new shirt. "My father isn't dead. Valentine didn't kill him. Hodge lied to me; all these years I thought he was dead, but he wasn't."

Clary's eyes slid around the room, as if she was searching for the truth in the walls, as if it would be written there. "Well, if your father's really in this place, then where is he? Did Valentine kidnap him, too?"

Jace was almost irrationally angry. "My father—"

Jace cut off as the door opened and Valentine, his _father, _stepped in.

"So," He addressed Jace crisply, and Jace was overwhelmed by memories of his childhood: _"So, have you finished your schoolwork?" "So, how was your swordplay lesson?"_ "Have you gathered your things? Our Forsaken can hold off the wolf-men for only so—"

His father finally saw Clary then, and broke off with a flicker of astonishment. "What is this?" he asked, looking back to Jace.

Clary grabbed the dagger that Jace had given to her and pulled it quickly out of the sheath. She looked angry, the kind of angry that would've made her seem more radiant in any other situation but this one, the one where she was about to kill his father.

Jace caught at her wrist. "_No_," he told her firmly.

Clary looked astonished, and stared at him as if he was mentally deranged. "But, Jace—"

"Clary," he said resolutely, "this is my father."

There was a palpable pause, and Clary looked at him with a mixture of emotions—fear, disbelief, dizzying horror, and that dawning kind of horrible truth.

"I see I've interrupted something," Valentine said dryly.

"Son, would you care to tell me who this is? One of the Lightwood children, perhaps?"

"No," said Jace. He was mentally exhausted, and a little part of him didn't want to introduce Clary, but he knew he had to. "This is Clary. Clarissa Fray. She's a friend of mine. She—"

Valentine looked her over from head to toe, finally stopping at the red hilted dagger.

His face held a mixture of amusement and irritation. "Where did you come by that blade, young lady?"

Clary lifted her head defiantly. "Jace gave it to me," she told him icily.

"Of course he did," said Valentine, sounding calm. "May I see it?"

"No!" Clary stepped back, so Jace plucked the dagger out of her fingers. She turned around and stared at him with undisguised anger, enough to make him slightly guilty. He sent her an apologetic look.

"Jace," she hissed, sounding betrayed.

Jace felt ashamed down to his core, but Valentine was his family, and you had to be loyal towards family. "You still don't understand, Clary," he returned shortly, walking over to Valentine and giving him the dagger. "Here you go, Father."

Valentine examined the dagger closely. "This is a kindjal, a Circassian dagger. This particular one used to be one of a matched pair. Here, see the star of the Morgensterns, carved into the blade." He turned it over so Jace could see it. "I'm surprised the Lightwoods never noticed it."

"I never showed it to them," Jace responded. "They let me have my own private things. They didn't pry."

"Of course they didn't," Valentine said softly, handing the kindjal back to Jace. "They thought you were Michael Wayland's son."

Jace slid the dagger into his belt and looked up. "So did I," he responded quietly, stealing a glance at Clary as he spoke. He could tell by the set of her shoulders that she was scared.

Valentine looked at Clary. "Perhaps," he started, "it would be a good idea for you to sit down now, Clary?"

She crossed her arms defiantly, forever stubborn. "_No_."

"As you like." Jace's father pulled a chair over to the head of the table and sat down. After a hesitant pause, Jace sat down as well, beside a half-filled bottle of wine. "But you are going to be hearing some things that might make you wish you had taken a chair."

"I'll let you know if that happens," Clary answered him, her jaw set stubbornly.

"Very well." Valentine sat back, his hands behind his head. "Clary." He said her name as if mulling the taste of it on his tongue. "Short for Clarissa? Not a name _I_ would have chosen." His lips curled into a smirk, like he was saying a joke, but Jace was confused as to what it was.

Jace saw Clary cast him another pleading look out of the corner of his eye, but he pretended to be staring down at the wineglass and focused on not letting his emotions show to his father (and more importantly, to Clary—he couldn't let her see what he was feeling, no, not at all).

"I don't really care what you would have chosen," Clary spat back at him, her voice laced with venom.

"I am sure," Valentine retorted coolly, leaning towards her. "That you don't."

"You're not Jace's father," Clary insisted. Jace, meanwhile, had to hold back his sigh. Why wouldn't she just accept it? "You're trying to trick us. Jace's father was Michael Wayland. The Lightwoods know it. Everyone knows it."

"The Lightwoods were misinformed," Valentine informed her crisply. "They truly believed—_believe_ that Jace is the son of their friend Michael. As does the Clave. Even the Silent Brothers do not know who he really is. Although soon enough, they will."

"But the Wayland ring—"

"Ah, yes." Valentine's smirk grew more pronounced with every word and he looked at the ring on Jace's hand. "The _ring_. Funny, isn't it, how an _M_ worn upside down resembles a _W_? Of course, if you'd bothered to think about it, you'd probably have thought it a little strange that the symbol of the Wayland family would be falling star. But not at all strange that it would be the symbol of the Morgensterns."

Clary stared at Valentine. "I have no idea what you mean."

"I forget how regrettably lax mundane education is," Valentine said. "Morgenstern means 'morning star.' As in How are thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!"

Clary shivered slightly. "You mean Satan."

"Or any great power lost," Valentine corrected her. "Out of a refusal to serve. As mine was. I would not serve a corrupt government, and for that I lost my family, my lands, almost my life—"

"The Uprising was your fault!" Clary spat at him, banging her hands down on the table, her the muscles in her arms taut with tension. "People _died_ in it! Shadowhunters like you!"

"_Clary_." Jace leaned towards her, nearly upsetting the wineglass. "Just _listen_ to him, will you? It's not like you thought. Hodge lied to us."

"I know," Clary retorted, still looking furious. "He betrayed us to Valentine. He was Valentine's pawn."

"No," said Jace. "No, Hodge was the one who wanted the Mortal Cup all along. He was the one who sent the Raveners after your mother. My father—Valentine only found out about it afterward, and came to stop him. He brought your mother here to heal her, not to hurt her."

"And you believe that crap?" Clary returned, sounding deeply disgusted. "It isn't true. Hodge was working for Valentine. They were in it together, getting the Cup. He set us up, it's true, but he was just a tool."

"But he was the one who needed the Mortal Cup," argued Jace. "So he could get the curse off him and flee before my father told the Clave about everything he'd done."

"I know that isn't true!" said Clary hotly. "I was there!"

She turned on Valentine. "I was in the room when you came to get the Cup. You couldn't see me, but I was there. I saw you. _You_ took the Cup and _you_ lifted the curse off Hodge. He couldn't have done it by himself, even he said so."

"I did lift his curse," Valentine said equably. "But I was moved by pity. He seemed so pathetic."

"You didn't feel pity. You didn't feel anything."

"That's enough, Clary!" Jace snapped, flushing a light pink. "Don't talk to my father like that."

"He's not your father!"

Jace felt thoroughly annoyed. "Why are you so determined not to believe us?"

"Because she loves you," Valentine put in, his smirk growing even more as Clary paled drastically.

"What?" Jace asked, surprised.

Valentine looked at Clary, amused. "She fears I am taking advantage of you," he answered slyly. "That I have brainwashed you. It isn't so, of course. If you looked into your own memories, Clary, you would know it."

"Clary." Jace started to get to his feet, his eyes on her. He needed to prove it to her, somehow. "I—"

"Sit down," his father ordered. "Let her come to it on her own, Jonathan."

Jace obeyed instantly, and sat back down in his chair.

"I thought your name was Jace," Clary asked, sounding as if she was fishing for anything to back up her case. "Did you lie about that, too?"

"No. Jace is a nickname."

"For what?"

Jace looked at her incredulously. "It's my initials," he told her. "J. C."

"Jonathan," Clary repeated, looking sick and nauseous as if some horrible possibility had just occurred to her. "Jonathan Christopher."

Jace was starting to get worried now; how did she know his middle name? "How did you—?"

"Jace, I had thought to spare you. I thought a story of a mother who died would hurt you less than the story of a mother who abandoned you before your first birthday," Valentine cut in soothingly.

Jace's mind whirled furiously as his fingers unconsciously tightened around the stem of the wineglass. "My mother is alive?"

"She is," Valentine confirmed, looking grave. "Alive, and asleep in one of the downstairs rooms at this very moment. Yes," he said, cutting the horrified words that Jace was about to say. "Jocelyn is your mother, Jonathan. And Clary—Clary is your sister."

Jace jerked his hand back and the wineglass spilled red fluid across the table, spreading in a sickening imitation of blood.

"Jonathan," Valentine called softly.

_(Oh God.)_

Jace was horrified, terrified, and distraught all at once; Clary _couldn't _be his sister. It just wasn't possible. If she were, he wouldn't feel the way he did about her. "That's not true," he said shakily. "There's been a mistake. It couldn't possibly be true." _(God, no, oh god, no no no, this can't be true.)_

Valentine looked firmly back at Jace. "A cause for rejoicing," he said in a low, thoughtful voice. "I would have thought. Yesterday you were an orphan, Jonathan. And now a father, a mother, a sister you never knew you had."

_(Oh God, I'm a monster, aren't I?)_

"It isn't possible," Jace repeated, but knew deep down that his father spoke the truth and his stomach lurched. "Clary isn't my sister. If she were..." _Then I wouldn't love her like I do, and I wouldn't want her like I do._

"Then what?" Valentine asked softly.

_(Incest incest incest wrong wrong wrong.)_

Jace did not finish his sentence, but instead felt like his world was crashing down. It wasn't right, what he felt for his _sister, _it wasn't sisterly love at all, and it wasn't right—

Clary walked around the table and knelt beside him, tentatively reaching for his hand. "Jace—"

Jace yanked himself away from her and instead knotted his fingers in the tablecloth, disgusted with himself. "_Don't_,"he hissed wretchedly, knowing that this moment would change his life forever.

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><p><strong>Poor Jace. <strong>**:( **

**(Also, r****eviews are nice.)**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	6. Chapter 6 - Just a Kiss (EDITED)

**A/N: Okay, I swear to God that I meant to post this yesterday. But I have exams this week and I totally forgot about posting, so... yeah.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own.**

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><p><strong>to the ticking clock: Yeah, it was really sad to write. Thanks, though!<strong>

**to To Love Is To Destroy: Haha, thanks! :)**

**to dianscot: Thank you!**

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><p>There were many things that Jace didn't like. One of them was Simon, his <em>sister<em>'s boyfriend/bestie/nerd partner or _something _like that. Another was this whole sadistic joke of a fact that Clary was his sister; Clary, the girl he loved more than anyone else, was his sister. And now he had tricking faerie queens to add to that list as well.

"I know that I will not leave my sister here in your Court," Jace said, instead of the rude things he would have liked to say. "And since there is nothing to be learned from either her or myself, perhaps you could do us the favor of releasing her?"

The Queen smiled an awful, twisted smile that made Jace know she was planning something terrible. "What if I told you she could be freed by a kiss?"

_(Oh, no. Oh no, no, __no.)_

Jace felt a mixture of dread and excitement as he realized what the Seelie Queen meant: Clary. The Queen would make him kiss Clary—Clary, his _sister. _Rage broke free from the darkest parts of him, turned his vision red and made his mouth taste like copper. He realized then why rage was such a powerful thing—it pulled you under, made you reckless, turned you mad. He wanted to rip the Queen apart, burn the court down into cinders.

_(God, no, please.)_

He knew that she knew what she was doing, and she would take a disturbing amount of pleasure from it.

"You want Jace to kiss you?" Clary sounded innocently bewildered. Innocent—that's what she'd always been. She was light and he was dark.

(_Dark dark dark _dark_, no, not good._)

The Queen started laughing uproariously, like a drunken person in a bar that had just heard an awful joke. The laugh was echoed by the rest of the court, a sickening chorus, an evil sitcom audience. "Despite his charms," she said, settling back in her throne like she was preparing for a movie. "_That_ kiss will not free the girl."

_(Please, anything else, not this, not this monstrosity.)_

The four looked at each other, startled. "I could kiss Meliorn," Isabelle suggested timidly, though Jace was sure she knew what the queen was planning.

"Nor that. Nor any one of my Court."

Isabelle glanced at her companions and threw her hands up in the air. "I'm not kissing any of you," she stated resolutely, crossing her arms in irritation and pursing her lips. "Just so it's official."

"That hardly seems necessary," the Amazing Rat Boy interrupted, moving towards Clary and taking her by the elbows. "If a kiss is all…"

Jace saw red and tried vainly to push his jealousy down, knowing that Clary and Simon kissing would be the best (and most improbable) possibility.

_(Please, just let it be them, please.) _

"No," the Queen replied softly, amusement dancing sickly in her dangerous sea eyes, "that is not what I want either."

Isabelle rolled her eyes impatiently. "Oh, for the Angel's sake. Look, if there's no other way of getting out of this, I'll kiss Simon. I've done it before, it wasn't that bad."

"Thanks," Rat Boy replied darkly to her. "That's very flattering."

"Alas," The Queen said, silencing them both, "I'm afraid that won't do either."

"Well, I'm not kissing the mundane," Jace felt the need to state. "I'd rather stay down here and rot."

"Forever?" Simon asked. "Forever's an awfully long time."

Jace raised his eyebrows, forcing his mask on. "I knew it," he responded, trying to sound as normal as he could, pushing the panic away. "You want to kiss me, don't you?"

Jace knew had gotten under the mundie's skin, because a moment later Rat Boy threw his hands up in the air in exasperation. "Of course not. But if—"

"I guess it's true what they say," Jace observed. Pretending was easier the longer you did it. "There are no straight men in the trenches."

"That's atheists, jackass," Rat Boy said angrily. "There are no _atheists_ in the trenches."

"While this is all very amusing," the Queen interrupted calmly, and leaning forward, "the kiss that will free the girl is the kiss that she most desires. Only that and nothing more."

Jace could see that Clary understood the Queen's plan now. He could see her face change, how befuddlement changed to horror and shock, turning the planes of her face hard and her skin light green. She displayed the exact emotions that Jace kept locked away, except for the monstrous relief.

"Why are you doing this?" Jace snapped at the faerie queen, not caring to be polite.

"I rather thought I was offering you a boon," the Queen answered delicately, examining her fingernails. Jace felt his face flush heatedly, but decided against saying anything as he avoided looking at Clary.

"That's ridiculous. They're brother and sister," the mundie protested quickly.

The Queen shrugged. "Desire is not always lessened by disgust. Nor can it be bestowed, like a favor, to those most deserving of it. And as my words bind my magic, so you can know the truth. If she doesn't desire his kiss, she won't be free."

"It's not right! You can't make Clary do this!" The mundie burst out. He turned around and directed his next words at Clary. "You don't have to do this, Clary, it's a trick—"

"Not a trick," Jace corrected quietly, dread coiling into a hangman's knot in his throat and turning his mouth sour. "A test."

"Well, I don't know about you, Simon," Isabelle cut in sharply. "But I'd like to get Clary out of here."

"Like you'd kiss Alec," Simon retorted, still obscenely angry. He didn't have the right to be angry—_he_ wasn't a part of the biggest joke of history. "Just because the Queen of the Seelie Court asked you to?"

"Sure I would." Isabelle was annoyed and impatient now. "If the other option was being stuck in the Seelie Court forever? Who cares, anyway? It's just a kiss."

"That's right," Jace said. It was a lie, because a kiss with Clary was _never _just a kiss, it was always something more, something special—

Jace moved towards her and put a hand on her shoulder to turn her to face him. "It's just a kiss," he repeated, and the lie was forced, and harsh. It tasted foul in his mouth. He knew that he wanted to kiss Clary, and knew that he shouldn't, because it was so _wrong _in so many different ways, but he couldn't resist. He wanted it too much. He was a monster. "You can close your eyes and think of England, if you like," Jace told his sister softly, trying to placate her. It wasn't her fault, after all; she was the pure one. He was tainted, dark, bad.

"I've never even been to England," Clary replied in the same undertone as she shut her eyes.

Jace leaned down and hesitantly brushed his lips against hers. Surprisingly, Clary reacted and opened her lips up to his, reacting in ways that Jace had made sure he'd never imagined, relaxing against him and twining her hands around his neck. Jace wrapped his arms around her and threaded his hands in her hair. The kiss stopped being hesitant and gentle and changed to fierce, desperate and needy all at once. _Clary_. He wanted to never stop, to kiss her until they were one collective being, with two bodies and two mouths but the same soul. _Clary._

There was a sound that arose around the Court, and it brought Jace back to horrible reality. He hurriedly moved his hands to her shoulder blades before forcing, _wretching _himself away in the gentlest manner he could and pulling her arms away from his neck. He couldn't breathe; he felt like he was going to throw up. He was sick—sick in the head.

_(Why me, why are you doing this to me?)_

Cary stared at Jace in either astonishment or shock, he couldn't tell. She had that look on her face, the one she always wore when she studied someone as if trying to learn their deepest secrets. Jace struggled to arrange his expression into one that he hoped wasn't as vulnerable as he felt and he looked away.

(_Oh God, why did you make me a monster?)_

"Was that good enough?" he called over to the Queen, trying not to sound as bitter as he felt. "Did that entertain you?"

The Queen's hand was over her mouth, covering half of her smile, but not enough to stop Jace from hating himself. "We are quite entertained," she said softly. "But not, I think, so much as the both of you."

Jace was bitter down to his core. Isabelle and Simon were regarding the scene that unfolded in front of them with identical gaping mouths and shocked eyes. He really was a monster, wasn't he? He just kissed his own sister.

And that was why he was bitter. It wasn't because of the Queen's game—it was because he had just kissed Clary, his _sister_, and he wanted to never stop kissing her again.

And that was the scary part.

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><p><strong>Dang, Jace sure is angsty. <strong>

**(Also, hint: I really, really like reviews.)**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	7. Chapter 7 - Sickening (EDITED)

**A/N: EDIT AS OF 30/06/2014: I should probably just stop apologizing, because I'm most likely not going to be able to stick to this updating schedule, and I'll be apologizing in every other chapter. So, this is an all-encompassing apology: I'm sorry for being lazy and forgetting to update and/or being busy, etc.**

****Disclaimer: I don't own TMI.****

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><p><strong>to vampchick09: Thanks! That's always been one of my favorites, too. One of my favorite Deviant art artists (her name's burdge, chances are some of you know her already ;)) drew this scene. Just type in "the seelie kiss by burdge bug" on Google and you'll find it.<strong>

**to Megatron13: Aww, thanks :). I've always wondered what Jace's perspective would be throughout the books, so... viola. The story was born :)  
><strong>

**to the ticking clock: Thank you! I had great fun making up the nicknames for Simon. Oh, and I sent you a PM response to your reviews. Did you get it?**

**to Sara: Oh my gosh... thank you so much for reminding me of this part! I had originally planned to do the scene in Luke's living room where Jace corners her and Simon interrupts them... so, in thanks, there's a special post for you on my tumblr. The link's on my profile, all you should have to do after that is type in /tagged/tmi+fanfiction and you should be able to get to it :)  
><strong>

**to To Love Is To Destroy:Thanks! I hope you'll think this one's good too ;)**

**to Region and District: Thanks! I hoped that this was like Jace, and apparently it is :)**

**to dianscot: Thank you!**

**to tobestardust: I could never decide whether I liked this scene or not in the books, so I understand. Thanks though :)**

**to TarrynLeigh: Thank you so much! Me really loving Jace's character was actually the reason why I started this fic, to be honest, so I feel you. (That sounds weird, doesn't it?)**

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><p>Jace almost groaned at the sight of his shower. He was covered in dirt and wet pond water and although he was too proud to admit it, he had to hold his shivers in.<p>

The shivers weren't purely from the cold, though. Mostly they were because he had just kissed Clary; Clary, his _sister._

Jace jerked the shower on with a sharp flick of his wrist, and let the bathroom fill with steam. He pulled his shirt off and just as he was about to do the same, he heard the mundane's voice from his bedroom.

"Hi, you've reached Simon. Either I'm away from the phone or I'm avoiding you. Leave me a message and—"

The only person who would want to call the mundane was Clary. Cautiously, Jace padded over to the door and leant against the frame, finding that she was indeed there, lying on his bed. He swallowed and forced himself to focus. "What are you doing?"

Clary closed her phone quickly and dropped it onto the bed. "Nothing. Checking the time."

"There's a clock next to the bed," Jace told her. Clary was nothing if she wasn't a bad liar. "You were calling the mundane, weren't you?"

"His name is Simon," Clary snapped as she rolled the shirt Jace had given her into a ball. "And you don't have to be such a bastard about him all the time. He's helped you out more than once."

"And now you feel guilty because he's run off. I wouldn't bother calling him. I'm sure he's avoiding you," Jace responded, trying to ignore the sick satisfaction he felt as she coloured.

"And you know this because you and he are so close?" Clary retorted angrily, scowling up at him.

"I know it because I saw the look on his face before he took off," Jace told her softly. "You didn't. You weren't looking at him. But I was."

Clary pushed her hair out of the way impatiently and glared up at Jace. "It's your fault," she said abruptly. "You shouldn't have kissed me like that."

Jace pushed himself away from the door in incredulity. "How should I have kissed you? Is there another way you like it?" He meant it sarcastically, but the monster in him—oh, who was he kidding, he _was_ the monster entirely—truly wanted to know.

"No." Her hands trembled slightly; whether it was the cold or the memory of the kiss, Jace didn't know. "I just don't want to be kissed by you."

"It didn't seem to me that either of us had a choice in the matter."

"That's what I don't understand!" Clary blurted out, clenching her fists until her knuckles turned white. "Why did she make you kiss me? The Queen, I mean. Why force us to do—that? What pleasure could she possibly have gotten out of it?"

"You heard what the Queen said. She thought she was doing me a favor," Jace responded. _And she was. _

"That's not true."

"It is true. How many times do I have to tell you? The Fair Folk don't lie."

Clary was silent for a while. Jace thought she might be thinking about what he'd said earlier, about faeries and what they'd do to you. "Then she was wrong," she finally said.

"She wasn't wrong." Jace retorted, a bitter edge to his voice. God, did he have to spell it out for her? He was evil, twisted. He loved her. "She saw the way I looked at you, and you at me, and Simon at you, and she played us like the instruments we are to her."

"I don't look at you," Clary whispered softly, a slight edge of pain entering her voice. Jace almost had to strain to catch her words.

"What?" Jace was sure he'd heard wrong. Either that or she was lying to herself.

"I said, I don't look at you," Clary repeated, slightly louder this time. There was still a bit of pain in her voice. Her hands were clamped together in her lap; when she released them, flexing her freckled fingers, Jace saw that her nails had left red crescents on her palms. "At least I try not to."

Jace was close to the truth now, and he knew it. He knew that his feelings weren't unrequited. He knew he wasn't the only sick one. "Why not?" he asked her, moving towards her. He heard her breath hitch slightly as he got closer.

"Why do you think?" Her words were barely audible, but her eyes, darkened to a kind of forest green, were fastened onto Jace's.

"Then why?" He heard the quaver in his voice, but made no move to fix it. Jace needed to get all of this out of his system. "Why all this with Simon, why keep pushing me away, not letting me near you—"

"Because it's _impossible_," Clary snapped, her voice breaking at the last word, and she sounded close to tears. He was the one who'd tainted her, hadn't he? God, he was a monster. "You know that as well as I do!"

"Because you're my sister," Jace finished, and Clary nodded at him.

"Possibly," he answered himself, and the rest of his words kept tumbling out, just like they always did around her. "And because of that, you've decided your old friend Simon makes a useful distraction?"

"It's not like that," Clary said, and the lie was evident in her slightly doubtful tone. "I love Simon."

"Like you love Luke," Jace snapped back, leaning closer. "Like you love your mother."

"No." Clary's voice was just like Maryse's when someone mentioned the Circle. "Don't tell me what I feel!"

Jace was furious; it was common knowledge that he hated it when people lied, and especially when they lied to themselves. "I don't believe you."

Clary got to her feet, not meeting his eyes. She looked defeated. "Jace," she pleaded, her voice quavering, "why are you doing this to me?"

"Because you're lying to me. And you're lying to yourself," Jace said, and his voice was laced with so much anger and so much venom that it surprised even him. But he needed her to say it.

Clary cracked and the words that he had wanted so badly to hear finally came pouring out. "What do you want me to tell you? The truth? The truth is that I love Simon like I should love you, and I wish he was my brother and you weren't, but I can't do anything about that and neither can you! Or do you have some ideas, since you're so goddamned smart?"

Jace sucked his breath in. He'd expected her to say something, _something, _but _nothing_ like this. She'd just confessed everything, and—

Clary saw his face and fought to regain her composure. "Jace, I'm sorry, I didn't mean—"

"No. You're not sorry. Don't be sorry." Jace hurried over to her and almost tripped over his feet in his haste. Jace Wayland _never _stumbled. He cupped her ashen face with his hands, and his hands prickled pleasurably where he was touching her. Clary looked like she had half a mind to pull away and run away, but she stayed there and stared at him.

"You don't understand," Jace said softly, and that quaver entered his voice again. "I've never felt this way about anyone. I didn't think I could. I thought—the way I grew up—my father—"

"To love is to destroy," Clary sounded numb. "I remember."

"I thought that part of my heart was broken," Jace admitted, and he'd never expected or to be able to tell Clary this. "Forever. But you—"

"Jace. Don't." Clary reached up and put her hands over his, intertwining their fingers. Her fingers were warm, and the sparks of before multiplied. "It's pointless."

"That's not true," Jace said. He knew he sounded desperate, but he _needed _to convince Clary of this. "If we both feel the same way—"

"It doesn't matter what we feel. There's nothing we can do." Clary's voice was miserable, bleak, as if she'd already resigned herself to a lifetime of inner torture. It would be incestuous to be together like this, but if it was with Clary, it didn't matter to Jace. He'd forfeit the world for her. "Where would we go to be together? How could we live?"

"We could keep it a secret."

"People would find out. And I don't want to lie to my family, do you?"

"What family?" Jace responded bitterly, and he knew his face was unguarded in that moment; he hoped it so, too. Maybe seeing his emotions would help convince her. Clary… he loved her too much that it hurt. It hurt with every single breath, every single step he took, to think that they were siblings, and might never be able to be together. It nearly destroyed him. "The Lightwoods hate me anyway."

"No, they don't. And I could never tell Luke. And my mother, what if she woke up, what would we say to her? This, what we want, it would be sickening to everyone we care about—"

"Sickening?" Jace's heart dropped from his mouth all the way down to the subterranean earth, deeper than the Silent Brother's vanguard. He'd known that that was the truth before—even called it that himself—but hearing those words from Clary was a thousand times worse. Like a thousand swords through the heart, like a thousand acid baths or a thousand torture sessions._ Sickening. _Jace dropped his hands from her face and stared at her, dumbfounded, hurt and stunned down to the core. His voice dropped into a hoarse whisper. "What we feel—what I feel—it's sickening to you?"

Clary stared at him, looking guilty and distressed, as if it hurt her to say the words. "Maybe," she whispered brokenly. "I don't know."

"Then you should have said that to begin with."

"Jace—"

Jace had already withdrawn into himself and wiped his expression clean, like nothing had ever happened. "I'm sorry I said anything, then," he told her stiffly. (_Sickening. You're a monster, Jace, a monster.)_ "I won't be kissing you again. You can count on that."

Jace turned his back on her and walked away, grabbing a towel off the door as he headed back towards the bathroom. "But—Jace, what are you doing?"

"Finishing my shower. And if you've made me run through all the hot water, I'll be very annoyed." Jace strode into the bathroom quickly and forcefully kicked the door shut, bending over the sink and bracing his hands on the counter, breathing raggedly. When he dared to look at his reflection in the mirror, he saw everything he felt, clear as day—the heartbreak, pain, and despair.

He closed his eyes and just stayed there for a few minutes, letting himself stew in his misery.

Clary—_Clary _had just called their love sickening. Even though Jace knew it wasn't right, it was real. It was more real than anything he'd ever imagined. It was like he was in a never-ending dream, and Clary had woken him up from it. He'd been fairly numb until he'd met Clary, and so many new emotions had come up—romantic love, pure anger, and true happiness. And now he had heartbreak to add to that list.

Jace stripped his remaining clothes off and stepped into the shower, wishing the icy water could wash his agony and shame away.


	8. That's What I Wanted (EDITED)

**A/N: I'm actually updating on time! WOW. This is new.**

**Anyways, I got a PM from vampchick09 the other day about the whole updating situation a little bit better: **

**When I first proposed the editing of this story, I gave fans two choices: 1) I could post the new chapters as a new story, or 2) I could replace the chapters in the existing story as I edit them. Almost everyone chose the latter. And then I realized the flaw: I can't "upload" edited chapters in their designated chapter slot (i.e. edited chapter 7 in the chapter 7 slot) without difficulties. Basically, I could either a) replace/update the chapters, which would replace the chapters in their correct slot but wouldn't send the notification that new chapters are up, b) first upload the edited chapters as chapter 13s and then put them back in their proper spot, or c) delete all the existing chapters and upload as if it was a new story. So I chose the second option because although it's not ideal, I felt it was the best.**

**Basically, in short, it's a crappy solution but it's the best one I have. I don't like it, but I don't really know what else to do. I'm open to suggestions if any of you have some!**

****Disclaimer: I do not own.****

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><p><strong>to bookworm16: Thank you so much! Oh, and about that characters-in-highschool thing: <em>I know, right? <em>It annoys me too. There's only about one TMI AH/highschool fic I can stand (well, technically two, including the Jace-POV companion fic). It's called _Project Marriage, _and it's by this fanfiction author with the penname Thalia Marie Grace. I've been following her basically since I got an account on here, so yeah. She's a good writer. If you haven't already read that fic, I reccomend it.**

**to Sara: Thanks! You know, the whole closed-off Jace persona during that whole sibling disaster was one of the reasons I started writing this. I was fed up with the lack of Jace POV in the books!**

**to dianscot:Thank you!**

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><p>Jace took the elevator down from the Institute. Now that he was free, he planned on going down to Luke's house to visit Clary. So much had happened in the last few days, and there were still things that needed to occur.<p>

The elevator finally clanged to the floor and the doors opened to reveal the very person Jace had wanted most to see, much to his surprise.

"—on," Clary finished, hastily dropping her arm. "Oh. Hi."

"Clary?" Jace asked, staring unblinkingly at her.

"You cut your hair," Clary blurted out.

Well, that certainly wasn't what Jace had expected her to say. He raised a hand subconsciously to his hair and then stopped it halfway. "Oh. Right. Maryse cut it." The elevator's doors started to close, and Jace nimbly stuck out his hand to halt them. "Did you need to come up to the Institute?"

Clary shook his head quickly. "I just wanted to talk to you."

"Oh." Jace was even more surprised at that, but stepped out of the elevator and walked over to her. "I was just running over to Taki's to pick up some food. No one really feels like cooking…" This was only a half-lie. He _was _planningon going over to Taki's… _after _he visited Clary.

"I understand," Clary responded automatically, and then winced as if she wished she hadn't said that.

"We can talk there," Jace told her, moving towards the door. When he didn't hear her following her, he paused before turning around to look at Clary. "Are you coming, or not?" he snapped, his words coming out harsher than he meant them to.

"Oh. Right. I'm coming." Clary quickened her pace to catch up to him, her red curls flying in the wind.

"I'm sorry," Clary said, and then winced at her words again. "They must be pretty miserable. All these people they knew are dead."

"It's different for Shadowhunters," Jace replied, glancing at her out of the corner of her eyes. Clary's cheeks were flushed out of the cold, and her wild hair was flying all over the place. "We're warriors. We expect death in a way you—"

Clary sighed, a half irritable, half exasperated sound. "'You mundanes don't.' That's what you were going to say, isn't it?"

"I was," Jace admitted. Taki's was right in front of them now, and the guard Ifrit was watching them suspiciously. "Sometimes it's hard even for me to know what you really are."

Clary looked at Jace, and a small smile tugged at her lips. "I'm Clary," she told him softly, innocently. She was stunning and she wasn't even trying. Jace had to force himself not to go into a tailspin.

Jace glanced down at her and pushed a lock of hair behind her ear in an almost subconscious gesture. That was what brothers did, right? "I know."

Once inside Taki's, Jace and Clary picked out a corner booth and sat opposite from each other. When Jace looked around, he saw that the place was practically deserted; only Kaelie, Jace's previous fling, and a pair of werewolves were there. The werewolves seemed to be arguing about who would win in a fight: Dumbledore from the Harry Potter series (and yes, Jace _had _read the books) or Magnus Bane.

"Dumbledore would totally win," one werewolf said. "He has the badass Killing Curse."

"But Dumbledore isn't real," the other retorted.

"I don't think Magnus Bane is real either," the first one said. "Have you ever met him?"

"This is so weird," Clary said, slumping down in her seat. "Are you listening to them?"

"No. It's rude to eavesdrop." Jace turned his attention to the menu, but soon stopped reading when he felt Clary's gaze on him. "You're staring at me," he announced, not bothering to look up from the list of specials to find out if he was right. "Why are you staring at me? Is something wrong?"

Kaelie then arrived at the table and looked at Clary. "Do you know what you want?"

Clary was obviously unprepared and ended up ordering a bunch of random and completely unappetizing items. Jace opted for a plate of sweet potato fries and some stuff for the Lightwoods.

"Tell Alec and Isabelle I'm sorry about everything that happened," Clary told him when Kaelie was out of earshot. "And tell Max that I'll take him to Forbidden Planet anytime."

"Only mundanes say they're sorry when what they mean is 'I share your grief,' " Jace replied dryly, though his mind was filled with hate for his father. "None of it was your fault, Clary. It was Valentine's."

"I take it there's been no…"

"No sign of him? No. I'd guess he's holed up somewhere until he can finish what he started with the Sword. After that…" Jace shrugged, trailing off. He didn't want to think about the rest.

"After that, what?" Clary pressed on, stubborn as ever.

"I don't know. He's a lunatic. It's hard to guess what a lunatic will do next." Jace avoided Clary's eyes, though he still knew she knew what he was thinking. All Valentine wanted was war with the Shadowhunters, and he would get it. The only thing momentarily stopping him was planning. "Anyway, I doubt that's what you came to talk to me about, is it?"

"No." Clary flushed and looked as if at a loss for words. "I've been wanting to talk to you for the past few days—"

"You could have fooled me," Jace said, his words a little too sharp. "Every time I called you, Luke said you were sick. I figured you were avoiding me. Again."

"I wasn't," Clary told him, annoyance flashing briefly in her emerald eyes. "I _did_ want to talk to you. I've been thinking about you all the time."

He made a surprised and accidental noise before holding his hand out to her. Clary took it carefully, looking relieved. _(Completely platonic, huh, Jace?) _"I've been thinking about you, too."

Jace squeezed Clary's hand, trying not to think about how nice it looked in his. "I really was sick," Clary told him quietly. "I swear. I almost died back there on the ship, you know."

Jace released her hand, but kept staring at her intently. "I know," he responded. "Every time you almost die, I almost die myself."

"Jace. I came to tell you that—"

"Wait. Let me talk first." He held his hands up to halt her next words. "Before you say anything, I wanted to apologize to you."

"Apologize? For what?"

"For not listening to you." Jace raked his hands through his hair nervously and tried to ignore the frantic ponding of his heart. "You kept telling me that I couldn't have what I wanted from you, and I kept pushing at you and pushing at you and not listening to you at all. I just wanted you and I didn't care what anybody else had to say about it. Not even you."

Clary opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, Kaelie reappeared with their orders. Clary continued to stare down at her food until she was gone. "Jace," she called, as Kaelie disappeared from sight. "You didn't do anything wrong. You—"

"No. Let me finish." Jace stared down at his fries intently. He couldn't look at her, not now. "Clary, I have to say it now or—or I won't say it." Jace blurted the rest of his words out. "I thought I'd lost my family. And I don't mean Valentine. I mean the Lightwoods. I thought they'd finished with me. I thought there was nothing left in my world but you. I—I was crazy with loss and I took it out on you and I'm sorry. You were right."

"No. I was stupid. I was cruel to you—"

"You had every right to be." Jace looked up at her before continuing. "What you said was true. We don't live or love in a vacuum. There are people around us who care about us who would be hurt, maybe destroyed, if we let ourselves feel what we might want to feel. To be that selfish, it would mean—it would mean being like Valentine."

He spoke his father's name as if that was final. "I'll just be your brother from now on," he said, looking at her and trying not to look like he felt, like his heart was being ripped apart into tiny shreds. "That's what you wanted, isn't it?"

Clary didn't answer for a few moments. "Yes," she said. Her voice sounded robotic, flat. Lifeless "That's what I wanted."

And Jace smiled at her casually, as if those four words hadn't just shattered his already fractured heart.

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><p><strong>Review, please!<strong>

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	9. Just Like Valentine (EDITED)

**A/N: I'M BAAAACK! This chapter was edited more than any of the other chapters so far, I think. I hope you all like it.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own.**

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><p><strong>to Green Adventurer: Thanks! I agree with you; I didn't really like City Of Ashes either for that reason. When I read the whole Lake Lyn battle ending scene in City of Glass, I was like "Hallelujah! No more angstyness!"<strong>

**to BAmbi Magenta ANn: Thank you! I've always wondered what Jace was thinking in these scenes, so I was just like, "Hmm... why don't I write it?". And I'm waaaay too lazy to write the whole series in Jace's POV :P. Oh, and I KNOW, RIGHT? I'm not trying to be mean or anything, but some people write Jace so uber-OOC that it makes me gag. I've always acknowledged that Jace is emotional and he's vulnerable, but he tries to hide it with his sarcasm and confidence. Thanks!**

**to Xxdazzled by twilightxX: Thanks for understanding! Whenever I have to post a notice that I'm taking a break from fanfiction I get this mental image of getting attacked by angry followers, so it's nice to know people understand. :)**

**to Jane-evelyn-Doe17: Yeah, it's pretty sad. (But thanks though!)**

**to dianscot: Isn't 'thanks' supposed to be my line? :P Thanks!**

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><p>Aline smiled at Jace seductively over her shoulder, and he idly wondered if she was planning on ending the tour in her bedroom. After all, she <em>did <em>have three buttons undone on her shirt. "And here's the library," she said, opening the brass handle. The library was large, and had enough books to make Jace's old traitorous tutor jealous. Maybe even more. Hodge'd probably have a heart attack if he saw this library. _Not a bad option_, Jace mused without much emotion or malice behind it.

Aline stopped in front of a bookcase and turned around to face Jace. The sunlight streaming through the large window dappled her dark hair and brought her face into sharper relief, glinting off her teeth and eyes. _She's pretty, _he thought with the kind of detached clinicalness that one used when commenting on the weather. Normally, he would've gone for a girl that looked like Aline. She was plenty attractive enough, plenty willing enough. _But…Clary is beautiful._

And there were the words, the unspoken Downworlder in his head. _God_. He wished he could take it back, but it was already out there, floating away, another thing to torment him. Clary was a devil dressed like an angel. No, that wasn't right—she _was _innocent. She was an angel. It was _him _who was the monster for wanting her. She was _his_ sin, unwillingly. He was the devil.

But Aline was sort of pretty, and girls had distracted him before. And yes, Jace knew it was wrong to use them, but then again, he'd never been good with any of the seven virtues, only the sins. Because that's what he was—a sinner, right down to the core. And Aline seemed plenty willing enough to be a distraction from Clary.

So Jace turned into the other Jace, the one he kept for meeting girls in mundane bars or elsewhere when he wanted to forget. He stepped forward, close enough to smell her perfume (something floral that faintly burned his nose) and smiled at her beguilingly. "Your house is wonderful," he said, purposely lowering his tone, using the moves he'd used many times before. "Just as beautiful as you are."

And gauging that Aline wasn't going to slap him if he kissed her, he leant forward and kissed her. She seemed surprised at first—her lips stayed slack for a moment, and then she gasped quietly into his mouth before recovering and kissing him back almost feverishly.

Jace wrapped his arms around Aline's bony waist and tried his hardest to forget about Clary; Clary, who was safe and sound back in New York (thank the Angel); Clary, who had hair that shone with bronze highlights in the sun, and who had lips that were soft and tasted like strawberries—

_Damn it, Jace, _he told himself exasperatedly, guilt building in his throat as he and Aline started to play tonsil tennis. _Can't you ever forget about her?_

So Jace chose his only other option: pretend that Aline was Clary. He knew deep down that it was wrong, that he shouldn't do it. But he wanted it so badly that the guilt was forced down.

Jace kissed Aline with all the passion he could muster, and pulled her flush against him, causing her to gasp into his mouth again. He closed his eyes purposefully, and tried to imagine that it was Clary who was nipping at his lip and not Aline. It worked better than he thought it would—he had to keep from moaning Clary's name.

All of the sudden, Jace heard the door bang shut and he opened his eyes, pulling away from Aline. And what he saw almost made his jaw drop.

It was Clary, standing in the doorway and looking like a cornered demon: scared, shocked witless, and… nauseous?

Aline quickly did up the buttons on her shirt and frowned at Clary disdainfully. "Excuse me," she said rudely. "Who are you?"

Clary didn't answer and just stared back at Jace, who was trying to stop his renewed sense of guilt from showing on his face. _Why is Clary here? She's supposed to be in New York!_

"Aline," Jace said flatly, "this is my sister, Clary."

"Oh. _Oh_." All of the sudden, Aline had turned abashed. "Sorry! What a way to meet you. Hi, I'm Aline."

She walked towards Clary, who still seemed to be frozen. Clary looked at Jace, and her expression was mixed with several emotions: Betrayal, disgust towards Aline and Jace (but mostly Aline, hopefully), and horror.

Jace emotionlessly took Aline by the shoulders. "Can we have a moment?" he whispered, tilting his head at Clay and trying not to sound as guilty as he did. Aline looked mildly surprised, but shrugged and wordlessly left the room.

Jace still couldn't believe that Clary was in Idris. He'd told her she couldn't come with him, lied to her and others, said she couldn't come, _and _left New York early…but somehow, Clary had found a way. Figures; it _was _Clary he was talking about, after all.

Neither of them said anything for a few terrible moments. It was Clary who finally broke the silence. "Jace," Clary whispered, stepping towards him.

Jace couldn't be near her, not now (not really ever), and he backed up hastily, trying to forget what he'd just done, the image of her kissing him so potent and intoxicating in his mind. "_What_," he snapped harshly, "in the name of the Angel, Clary, are you doing here?"

Clary looked hurt. Jace made himself not care. "You could at least pretend you were glad to see me. Even a little bit."

"I'm not glad to see you," Jace enunciated slowly, feeling anger bubble up under his skin. She never thought about anything, did she? God. She didn't understand the danger she was in. "Not even a little bit."

"This isn't you," Clary said shakily, looking up at him with slightly glassy eyes. Jace was too angry to care. He'd finally snapped. "I hate it when you act like this—"

"Oh, you hate it, do you? Well, I'd better stop doing it, then, hadn't I? I mean, you do everything _I _ask you to do."

"You had no right to do what you did!" she shouted at him angrily. "Lying to me like that. You had no right—"

"I had _every right_!" Jace yelled, shouting at her like he never had before. _Clary shouldn't be here. She could get hurt, or Valentine could find her!_ _She needs to leave! _"I had every right, you stupid, _stupid_ girl. I'm your brother and I—"

"And you what? You own me? You don't own me, whether you're my brother or not!"

The door behind Clary was flung open, and Alec stood in the doorway looking at Jace incredulously. "What in all possible dimensions is going on here?" he said, his eyes darting in between Jace and his sister with astonishment. "Are you two trying to kill each other?"

"Not at all," Jace said as he rearranged his features into his usual expression. "Clary was just leaving."

"Good," Alec said. "Because I need to talk to you, Jace."

"Doesn't anyone in this house ever say, 'hi, nice to see you' anymore?" Clary asked angrily, her face flushed and her eyes dark with irritation.

Apparently, spending time with Magnus the sparkly warlock had softened Alec. "It _is _good to see you, Clary," Alec told her, in a much calmer voice than Jace would've used. "Except of course for the fact that you're really not supposed to be here. Isabelle told me you got here on your own somehow, and I'm impressed—"

"Could you _not _encourage her?" Jace asked his adopted brother irritably, turning to glare at Alec at full force. Alec didn't even flinch, unfortunately.

"But I really, really need to talk to Jace about something. Can you give us a few minutes?" Alec continued, nonplussed as he chanced a cautious look at Clary.

"I need to talk to him too," Clary retorted bitingly. "About our mother—"

"I don't feel like talking," Jace informed her as calmly as he could. It took all of his determination not to blow up again. "To either of you, as a matter of fact."

"Yes, you do," Alec told him, frowning slightly. "You really want to talk to me about this."

"I doubt that," Jace said, despite understanding that it was something about the bloodsucker. He looked back at Clary, realizing something for the first time. "You didn't come here alone, did you?" Jace said, feeling horrified. If Luke had come with her… "Who came with you?"

"Luke," Clary responded hesitantly, sounding slightly anxious. Jace noticed that she looked worried, as if she knew that it was bad. "Luke came with me."

Jace felt the color drain out of his face. _This is _not _good._ "But Luke is a Downworlder. Do you know what the Clave does to unregistered Downworlders who come into the Glass City—who cross the wards without permission? Coming to Idris is one thing, but entering Alicante? Without telling anyone?"

"No," Clary said quietly. Her lip was trembling, and her green eyes were shining with tears. "But I know what you're going to say—"

"That if you and Luke don't go back to New York immediately, you'll find out?"

Jace said nothing else and just stared at her. _She _needs _to leave!_ And he would've done anything, even if it meant hurting her, to keep her safe.

"Jace," Alec said, breaking the silence. He sounded panicked, as if something bad had happened. Maybe it had. Jace didn't care anymore. "Haven't you wondered where I've been all day?"

"That's a new coat you're wearing," Jace said, not sparing a glance for the older boy. "I figure you went shopping. Though why you're so eager to bother me about it, I have no idea."

"I didn't go shopping," Alec sounded very angry, and Jace felt a kind of sadistic pleasure. (_To love is to destroy, right?) _"I went—"

The door was opened again and Isabelle hurried in, closing the door softly behind her. She transferred her gaze to Clary and shook her head. "I told you he'd freak out," Isabelle announced, sighing exasperatedly. "Didn't I?"

"Ah, the 'I told you so,'" Jace interjected idly. "Always a classy move."

Clary looked at Jace. Her face was horrified, and she was looking at him like she was seeing him in an entirely new light—a bad one. The real one. "How can you _joke_?" she whispered shakily, her voice trembling. Jace knew she was close to tears, but he was gone. Too far gone past caring. He wanted to hurt her now, wanted to yell at her and believe all the things he was saying. "You just threatened Luke. Luke, who likes you and trusts you. Because he's a _Downworlder_. What's wrong with you?"

Isabelle's mouth fell open in dismay. "Luke's here? Oh, Clary—"

"He's _not _here," Clary corrected the older girl impatiently. "He left—this morning—and I don't know where he went. But I can certainly see now why he had to go."

Clary wouldn't meet Jace's eyes. Jace didn't let himself feel the shame. "Fine. You win. We should never have come. I should never have made that Portal—"

"_Made _a Portal?" Isabelle looked taken aback. "Clary, only a warlock can make a Portal. And there aren't very many of them. The only Portal here in Idris is in the Gard."

"Which is what I had to talk to you about," Alec whispered harshly to Jace. Jace didn't say anything and just stood there, feeling even more and more horrified by the minute. "About the errand I went on last night—the thing I had to deliver to the Gard—"

"Alec, stop. _Stop_," Jace said desperately, and Alec immediately stopped talking. Alec looked at Jace worriedly, biting his lip.

Alec shut his mouth and stood staring at Jace, his lip caught between his teeth. Jace wasn't looking at him, or Isabelle—he was looking at Clary. If she wouldn't listen to the truth, then she would have to listen to a lie. Jace hated lying, but in this scenario he would have to lie anyway. It was the best option. And the one he wanted to use the most. "You're right," Jace told her bitterly, forcing the words out. He couldn't hold back the shame this time. He hated the words the moment they came out. "You should never have come. I know I told you it's because it isn't safe for you here, but that wasn't true. The truth is that I don't want you here because you're rash and thoughtless and you'll mess everything up. It's just how you are. You're not careful, Clary."

"Mess…everything…up?" Clary sounded heartbroken, and Jace watched painfully as a tear made its way down her cheek. He could see his reflection in the shine of her eyes, and he focused on it. And his next words weren't to her, but to himself.

From beside Clary, he heard Isabelle say, "oh, _Jace_," dejectedly. He didn't need pity. He was a monster. Monsters don't deserve pity.

"You always just race ahead without thinking," he continued, his words sounding less forced by the minute. "You know that, Clary. We'd never have ended up in the Dumort if it wasn't for you."

"And Simon would be _dead_! Doesn't that count for anything? Maybe it was rash, but—"

"_Maybe?" _Jace asked her incredulously, making himself look at her as if he was wondering if she was mentally retarded. His self-hatred doubled.

"But it's not like every decision I've made was a bad one! You said, after what I did on the boat, you _said _I'd saved everyone's life—"

Jace blanched. No one else knew what had happened that night, and if they did, she could get hurt. He spoke to her harshly, venom lacing his voice, all the while telling himself that he was protecting her, that this was necessary. "Shut _up_, Clary, SHUT _UP_—"

"On the boat?" Alec's befuddled gaze darted between Jace and Clary. "What about what happened on the boat? Jace—"

"I just told you that to keep you from whining!" Jace shouted at Clary, almost subconsciously stepping closer to get in her face. He focused on her, and he ignored the world. _She has to leave, she _has_ to leave_, he thought desperately. He kept staring at his reflection in her eyes, his voice now laced with real anger, half at Clary's stubbornness and the rest at himself. "You're a disaster for us, Clary! You're a mundane, you'll always be one, you'll never be a Shadowhunter. You don't know how to think like we do, think about what's best for everyone—all you ever think about is yourself! But there's a war on now, or there will be, and I don't have the time or the inclination to follow around after you, trying to make sure you don't get one of us killed!"

She just stared at Jace, looking at him so wretchedly that all he wanted to do was apologize and hold her. But he couldn't, and his anger returned. _Doesn't she realize how much danger she's in?_

"Go home, Clary," he said wearily. "Go home." _(Please, I can't look at you after this.)_

Clary walked over to the door as if every step pained her, and Alec and Isabelle moved to let her pass. They both looked shocked and embarrassed, as if they'd never thought Jace could hurt her like that.

When Clary had reached the door, she turned around and met Jace's eyes. Guilt rocked him to the core. "When you told me the first time that Valentine was your father, I didn't believe it," she told him softly, the pain only half concealed in her voice. "Not just because I didn't want it to be true, but because you weren't anything like him. I've never thought you were anything like him. But you are. You _are_." And then Clary walked out of the room and shut the door behind her forcefully.

The minute she had left the room, Jace leaned back against the wall and slid down to the floor, putting his head in his hands. He didn't feel relieved. He just felt ashamed and even more of a monster than before.

_Why does it always have to be like this?_

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><p><strong>More angst. angsty!Jace really makes me want to cuddle him and make it all better because he seems so sad. That's probably just me, though. I'm weird, sorrynot sorry.**

**Anywho, please review if you liked this chapter!**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	10. Demon Blood (EDITED)

**A/N: I had no internet. I promise.**

**Just a reminder, but after this there will only be 2 more chapters left in this fic. It all went so fast!**

****Disclaimer: I don't own. Cassie Clare does.****

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><p><strong><strong>to Xxdazzled by twilightxX: Thank you! It took me a while to write that chappie because I wanted to stay true to Jace's character. And thanks for understanding :)<strong>**

******to Sara: Thanks :) Not just for being understanding about the whole break thing, but for being a dedicated reader!******

**to the ticking clock: Aww, thanks! :3**

**to babynomore: Yeah, I agree. Clary should've hated him for _way_ longer! I mean, I'd probably never forgive Jace myself, so I shouldn't be talking... Thanks! And yes, they do need emoticons here. Majorly.**

**to To Love Is To Destroy: Thank you :)**

**to bookworm16: Thanks! I really try to keep my characters in character (?).**

**to krizue: Thanks! :D**

**to Clessa Winters: Okay, first of all I want to say you are the best reviewer ever. When I logged onto my email and saw your review, I legitimately squealed. Thank you thank you _thank you!_ Oh, and I _try_ to be serious about my work. I'm not sure how well that works, 'cuz I have ADHD and sometimes I'm like the dog from Up ("SQUIRREL!")... so yeah! Thanks, for the compliment on my writing style. I try to write like the original author, but since every author is different... I'm not always sure how good I am :). Oh, and I'm really sorry, but after I finish the COG moments, this fic is over :(. I'll still do TMI fanfics, but this one will be complete in two more chapters. (Also, edit as of 21/07/2014: Thank you for reviewing this story, because you've become one of my best internet friends ever.)**

**to Jordan: Haha, thanks! Yeah, I still think that Jace can be slightly douche-y at times, but most of what he does is to protect Clary. Thanks again :)**

**to dianscot: I've added more of Jace's thoughts in the redo. I hope you'll like it better now :)**

**to tobestardust: I agree, there is a lot of angst. I don't really like angst myself, but I have to put it in to stay true to the books. Thank you, though. I think that you almost crying (even though I'm sorry, please don't cry) is sort of a compliment to me. :)**

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><p>Jace was still in shock. His head was spinning with and infinite number of thoughts, everything from <em>oh god, I'm part demon <em>to _so that explains why I love Clary like I do_.

But because he was a Shadowhunter and he was inside a manor that was about to blow up, Jace temporarily pushed all of those thoughts out of his head as he grabbed his father's favorite chair and threw it through the stained glass window with only the smallest hint of satisfaction.

But even this short burst of satisfaction was short-lived, because then he looked around and saw the prized marble bust of Raziel fall from its pedestal and started to fall towards Clary. _Oh no._

The redhead in question turned towards him and met her eyes frantically, about to shout a warning. But thankfully Clary saw his frantic glance and noticed the bust, quickly diving out of the way before the bust hit the floor exactly where she'd been standing.

With an internal sign of relief, Jace grabbed her around the waist and hoisting her up bridal style, and before she could protest in her usual stubborn fashion, he carried her over to the broken window and dropped her out of it and onto the hilltop beneath. After Clary was tumbling down the hill, Jace jumped out the window after her.

When he'd hit the same hillock that Clary had, breathless and grass-stained, Jace rolled into a crouch and looked up at his old house. It wasn't in good shape—there was the orange tint of fire from inside one of the windows, a clear sign that the manor was about to blow. And he didn't even have to think about it—these instincts were part of being a Shadowhunter, after all—as he grabbed Clary roughly by the tops of her arms and knocked her over, and rolling on top of her as to shield her body with his own.

He'd been right in assuming that the house would blow up. Only a few seconds later, there was a huge roar as the manor house imploded. Jace could see the orange and red mushroom cloud out of the corner of his eye, tinged by ash. He could smell the burnt air and feel the shrapnel fly down around them in a horrific parody of rain.

Jace pressed Clary's body farther into the ground and waited for the explosion to subside. He could hear his own heartbeat, and it was now almost as loud and frantic as his thoughts, wild not only with adrenaline but with the newfound knowledge of his parentage.

Finally, the explosion subsided, and all one could hear were frightened birds chirping. Jace exhaled in relief, allowing his eyes to close. _Okay, it's over, Clary's fine—_

"Jace," the sister in question said, her voice soft and hoarse. "I think I dropped your stele somewhere."

Jace pulled back and propped himself up on his elbows as he looked down at her. "That's all right," he told her. (_God, I must truly be a demon to want someone as pure as this.)_ "As long as you're not hurt."

"I'm fine." Clary reached up and ran her fingers through his hair; it could have been a subconscious move, but the reaction it stirred in Jace was most definitely not welcome, especially given their proximity.

Clary must've noticed Jace flinching "There was grass in your hair," Clary explained hoarsely. There was something close to desperation in her eyes.

"You shouldn't touch me," he told her, forcing himself to look away.

Clary's hand had traveled down to Jace's cheek, and it froze there. "Why not?"

"You know why," he snapped, visions of another version of her in his mind, the one that wasn't his sister and he could do all sorts of un-sisterly things with. It took all his remaining willpower to rolled off of Clary and onto his back beside her, fixing his eyes on the ashen sky. "You saw what I saw, didn't you? The past, the angel. And our parents."

He saw Clary look at him out of the corner of his eye, but he kept his eyes away from her. "I saw," Clary responded gently.

"You know what I am," Jace whispered, hearing the anguish in his own voice. His whole world was falling down; everything he'd fought, everything that he'd hated since he could walk was a part of him. "I'm part demon, Clary. Part _demon_. You understood that much, didn't you?" Jace looked at Clary now, and saw his own face reflected in her emerald eyes— tortured, scared, and horrified. "You saw what Valentine was trying to do. He used demon blood—used it on me before I was even born. I'm part monster. Part everything I've tried so hard to burn out, to destroy."

Clary was looking at him desperately, and Jace could tell she was almost as agonized as he was. "But warlocks are part demon. Like Magnus. It doesn't make them evil—"

"Not part Greater Demon. You heard what the demon woman said."

"It's not true. It can't be," Clary said, and now her voice was trembling, the fear in Jace's eyes mirrored in her own. "It doesn't make sense—"

"But it does," Jace said, and he needed to get the words out or they'd never be said. _Why couldn't Clary see the truth?_ "It explains _everything_."

"You mean it explains why you're such an amazing Shadowhunter? Why you're loyal and fearless and honest and everything demons _aren't_?"

"It explains," Jace heard own his voice and it sounded a lot calmer, a lot less agonized then he felt. "Why I feel the way I do about you."

"What do you mean?"

Jace paused, wondering whether to just tell her the brutal truth; that even now, he had to restrain the urge to pin her back into the ground and kiss her senseless. "You're my sister," he said finally. "My sister, my blood, my family. I should want to protect you—" Jace laughed but there was no humor to it, no emotion at all. "To protect you from the sort of boys who want to do with you exactly what _I _want to do." _I shouldn't want to kiss you _every single time _I see you, or want to take you right then and there whenever you bite your lip—_

Jace was pulled out of his _demon-_likethoughts when he heard Clary's breath hitch. "You said you just wanted to be my brother from now on."

"I lied," Jace told her, and now he was telling her the brutal truth. "Demons lie, Clary. You know, there are some kinds of wounds you can get when you're a Shadowhunter—internal injuries from demon poison. You don't even know what's wrong with you, but you're bleeding to death slowly inside. That's what it's like, just being your brother."

"But Aline—"

"I had to _try. _And I did." He could hear his own voice, hear the flat and emotionlessness of it. "But God knows I don't want anyone but you. I don't even _want _to want anyone but you." As if in a trance, Jace reached out ran his hand through her beautiful red hair, and across her cheek lightly. "Now at least I know why."

The intensity of the look in Clary's eyes surprised him. "I don't want anyone but you, either."

It was Jace's turn for his breath to hitch. He turned over onto his side, and looked down at Clary. He had a plan, and as he was part demon, it made perfect sense to him. A part of him— probably the human part—knew it was wrong, but _God,_ he didn't care anymore.

He trailed his fingers down to Clary's perfect lips, tracing the outline with the tip of his finger. "You should probably," He started, smiling devilishly. "Tell me not to do this."

Clary said nothing. _Does she want this as much as I do?_

Jace leant down and brushed his lips against her cheek. He felt her tremble, and he knew with wicked certainty what his touch was doing to her. The demon liked it. "If you want me to stop, tell me now," he whispered softly, watching as her eyes darkened with desire.

Clary still didn't tell him to stop, so Jace took this as a sign of encouragement and brushed his lips against the hollow of her temple. "Or now." His mouth traced the line of her cheekbone, down to her forbidden lips. "Or now." Jace had left his lips just brushing against her, hesitating, the small good part in him waiting for her to say no. "Or—"

Clary reached up and roughly pulled Jace up against her. Jace used what remaining self-control he had to keep the kiss gentle, but Clary was having none of that; she grabbed Jace's shirt and used it to pull him harder against her, and a half-reluctant groan left his throat.

He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her even closer so they were tangled together, and they rolled over on the grass. Jace vaguely felt Clary tug off his jacket and his shirt, her hands exploring the newly exposed skin. _By the Angel._ Her kissed her even deeper as his hands fumbled with the buttons of Clary's coat, his hands shaking. Only Clary would be able to raise these emotions out of him; he'd lusted after girls before, but it'd never been _anything _like this before, never this craving, never this need.

"I'll do it," Clary gasped out, and she undid the last button herself and raised herself up to rid herself of the pesky fabric. Then Clary suddenly gasped in surprise, and Jace reluctantly pulled away.

"What is it?" Jace asked, his voice hoarse yet concerned. "Did I hurt you?"

"No. It was this." Clary touched the chain Jace had put the Morgenstern ring on, and stared at it in surprise.

"I'm sorry," he said, tracing the curve of her cheekbone. He wasn't really thinking about it; he was thinking about Clary, and how it felt to have her body against his. "I forgot I was wearing the damn thing."

Jace watched as the desire in Clary's eyes vanished and was replaced by horror. "Jace," she said, and her voice was low and husky from the kissing like his was. "Jace, don't."

"Don't what? Don't wear the ring?"

"No, don't—don't touch me. Stop for a second."

Jace sharply withdrew his hand and he stared at her. "Jace," Clary called again. "Why? Why now?"

In his surprise, Jace's mouth dropped open. "Why _what _now?"

"You said there was nothing between us. That if we—if we let ourselves feel what we might want to feel, we'd be hurting everyone we care about."

"I told you. I was lying," Jace replied quietly, feeling relieved that this wasn't because she was still adamant about them being only siblings. "You think I don't want to—?"

"No," Clary said firmly, meeting his gaze steadily. "No, I'm not stupid, I know that you do. But when you said that now you finally understand why you feel this way about me, what did you mean?"

Jace caught her wrists and pulled her hands up to his face, interlacing his fingers with hers. "You remember what I said to you at the Penhallows' house?" he asked her. "That you never think about what you do before you do it, and that's why you wreck everything you touch?"

"No, I'd forgotten that. Thanks for the reminder."

Jace dismissed the sarcasm. "I wasn't talking about you, Clary. I was talking about me. That's what _I'm _like." Jace turned his face away from her, and felt her fingers slide down his cheek. "At least now I know why. I know what's wrong with me. And maybe—maybe that's why I need you so much. Because if Valentine made me a monster, then I suppose he made you a sort of angel. And Lucifer loved God, didn't he? So says Milton, anyway."

Clary sucked in a breath. "I am _not _an angel. And you don't even know that that's what Valentine used Ithuriel's blood for—maybe Valentine just wanted it for himself—"

"He said the blood was for 'me and mine,'" Jace reminded her softly. "It explains why you can do what you can do, Clary. The Seelie Queen said we were both experiments. Not just me."

"I'm not an angel, Jace," Clary repeated, glaring up at him. "I don't return library books. I steal illegal music off the Internet. I lie to my mom. I am _completely ordinary_."

"Not to me," Jace whispered softly, and he looked at her.

_Clary isn't ordinary, not in the slightest. I'd never felt what I felt around her—love, vulnerability, anger—they were new to me. _"Clary, I—"

"Get off me," Clary said firmly.

"_What?" _In his surprise, Jace forgot his desire. It vanished just as the Wayland manor had.

"You heard me," Clary told him, setting her jaw stubbornly. "And leave my hands alone." And she pulled her hands away, clenching them into fists.

Jace stared at her angrily. Of all the things that he thought she'd do, this was not it. "I don't suppose you want to tell me _why_?"

"You think you only want me because you're evil, not human. You just want something else you can hate yourself for. I won't let you use me to prove to yourself how worthless you are."

"I never said that. I never said I was using you."

"Fine," Clary retorted acidly, glaring up at him. Even when she was mad, she was gorgeous. Jace forced himself to focus. "Tell me now that you're not a monster. Tell me there's nothing wrong with you. And tell me you would want me even if you didn't have demon blood."

When he met Clary's eyes, all he could feel was fury; some of it was towards Clary, but most of it was towards himself. He swore loudly and rolled off of Clary, savagely snatching his shirt off of the ground and pulling over his head, still glaring at her.

Jace heard Clary stand up and do the buttons on her coat. He knew she was upset, but hardly wanted to comfort her. She was right, and all he could feel was bitterness.


	11. Just One Night (EDITED)

**A/N: It's a Sunday. And I'm actually updating on time! WOW. This is the penultimate (second to last) chapter. I've already gotten attached to editing this, and I'll miss it.**

**Also, most of the words in **_italics _**are Jace's thoughts, except for the letter at the end, and in Jace's conversation with himself, the stuff in ****_bolded italics_**** is the second side of the conversation (if that makes sense?). And speaking of, I didn't write the letter; I found it off Cassie Clare's website and thought it was amazing, so I used it.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own.**

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><p><strong>to VeniVediVici: Ahah, thanks! And yes, us authors do like reviews :)<strong>

**to the ticking clock: Thank you!**

**to vampchick09: Thank you! And I agree, that scene was pretty awesome. And Jace and Clary can't stay mad at each other for long :)**

**to To Love Is To Destroy: Thank you :)**

**to Clessa Winters: Thanks! And haha, I've done that too! ;) You should actually have heard me when I finished COG. I literally squealed and then did that cliché fangirl hand thing... yeah, I have a thing for love stories too sometimes.**

**to krizue: Thanks! I'll try to make the chapters longer; this one's 2833 words... and the next one's gonna be a whopper. Also, I put more of hormone-driven!Jace into last chapter in the edit, so I hope you like it better.**

**to Sara: Thank you! And I don't want to do any COFA chapters because I wrote this story to just show how they got together, and not after that. And I'm actually not a big fan of that book...**

**to Xxdazzled by twilightxX: Thank you! Daww... And thank you again! :)**

**to dianscot: Thank you! That means a lot to me :)**

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><p>Jace stood beneath Clary's window with the thread of Clary's green coat still between his fingers, having a mental conversation with himself.<p>

_If Sebastian is still out there, then I'm the best person to take him out._

**_But what about Clary? She'll be upset—_**

_Oh, who gives a flying crap? Sebastian needs to get taken care of._

**_Well, _****I ****_care!_**

Suddenly, a possibility that was both wrong and right occurred to him.

_Hmm..._

**_God, don't even think about it! Clary will never even let you into her bed, even if it _****is ****_just for sleeping._**

_But you know you want to..._

**_That shouldn't matter! But... fine. Only if she lets me in._**

Jace sighed and nimbly climbed onto the windowsill, opening up the curtains and quickly stepping into the room's shadows.

Clary was there, sitting upright in the bed with a seraph blade ready in her hand. Her hair was tousled from sleep, and she was only wearing thin pyjamas—

_By the Angel, get a grip on yourself!_

Jace forced himself to ghost over to her and place a hand on hers gently. "It's all right," he said softly. "It's me."

Clary's breath went in quickly, and he withdrew his hand. "Jace," Clary responded sleepily, blinking rapidly. "What are you doing here? What's wrong?"

Jace didn't answer Clary, and just looked at her. _This might be the last time I ever look at Clary. For all I know, I could die trying to fight Sebastian, and I'd _never _see her again._

At his silence, Clary turned around and looked at Jace. She abruptly turned blushed pink and pulled the bed linens around her. If this were any other time, Jace would've smirked and made some smart-ass comment. But he couldn't feel anything other than dread.

Clary was looking up at him worriedly, her green eyes widening with concern. "Jace?" she asked softly, reaching a hand up and placing it on his shoulder. Her thumb rubbed over the collar of Jace's mourning jacket in what seemed to be an unconscious manner, but it did nothing to calm him down.

If this was going to be the last time Jace saw Clary, he'd have to make it count. His eyes swept over her face, memorizing it; her beautiful green eyes, framed with lashes. Her freckles, splashed all over her smooth visage like brown paint, and her tantalisingly soft lips. Her hair, and the way it felt to have his hand running through it when he kissed her.

Clary's words broke him out of his daze. "Are you all right?" she asked him, sounding even more anxious than before.

"I don't know," he responded numbly, rubbing a hand over his face to clear his thoughts. "I wasn't going to come here. I've been wandering around all night—I couldn't sleep—and I kept finding myself walking here. To you."

Clary sat up even straighter and looked Jace in the eye. "Why can't you sleep? Did something happen?" she said, and winced at her words as if realizing how stupid they sounded. Of course something had happened. Multiple things had happened. Jace forced himself not to wince himself, pushing Max's face out of his mind.

Jace dismissed the question easily. "I had to see you," he whispered. He didn't know whom he was talking to: himself or Clary. "I know I shouldn't. But I had to."

"Well, sit down, then," Clary said gently, tucking her legs in to make room for him to sit down. "Because you're freaking me out. Are you sure nothing's happened?"

"I didn't say nothing happened," Jace told her and sat down on the bed beside Clary. He faced her and looked her deep in the eyes again. (_Everything's happened, and it's killing _me.) He could see the fear in her eyes, the loss, and the agony. He could see most of the same emotions that were in his eyes reflected in hers.

"Is there bad news? Is everything—is everyone—"

"It's not bad," Jace responded, and he heard the despair and determination in is voice. He saw Clary's eyes widen subtly, and her body tense. "And it's not news. It's the opposite of news. It's something I've always known, and you—you probably know it too. God knows I haven't hid it all that well." His eyes searched her face, slowly, as if he meant to memorize it. He wanted to. "What happened," Jace continued hoarsely, "is that I realized something."

"Jace," Clary whispered, and there was real fear in her eyes and her voice. Some part of her understood, and clearly didn't like it. "Jace, you don't have to—"

"I was trying to go…somewhere," Jace told her softly. "But I kept getting pulled back here. I couldn't stop walking, couldn't stop thinking. About the first time I ever saw you, and how after that I couldn't forget you. I wanted to, but I couldn't stop myself. I forced Hodge to let me be the one who came to find you and bring you back to the Institute. And even back then, in that stupid coffee shop, when I saw you sitting on that couch with Simon, even then that felt wrong to me—I should have been the one sitting with you. The one who made you laugh like that. I couldn't get rid of that feeling. That it should have been me.

"And the more I knew you, the more I felt it—it had never been like that for me before. I'd always wanted a girl and then gotten to know her and not wanted her anymore, but with you the feeling just got stronger and stronger until that night when you showed up at Renwick's and I knew.

"And then to find out that the reason I felt like that—like you were some part of me I'd  
>lost and never even knew I was missing until I saw you again—that the reason was that<br>you were my sister, it felt like some sort of cosmic joke. Like God was spitting on me. I  
>don't even know for what—for thinking that I could actually get to have you, that I would deserve something like that, to be that happy. I couldn't imagine what it was I'd done that I was being punished for—"<p>

"If you're being punished," Clary interjected firmly. "Then so am I. Because all those things you felt, I felt them too, but we can't—we have to stop feeling this way, because it's our only chance." (_The two of us are a match made in Hell, aren't we?_)

Jace's curled his hands into fists; every time he brought this up, she'd say this. "Our only chance for _what_?"

"To be together at all. Because otherwise we can't ever be around each other, not even  
>just in the same room, and I can't stand that. I'd rather have you in my life even as a<br>brother than not at all—"

"And I'm supposed to sit by while you date boys, fall in love with someone else, get  
>married…?" he spat back angrily, mentally cringing at the images his own words conjured up. He couldn't stand the idea of Clary walking down the aisle, looking like the spitting image of an angel, exchanging vows with some faceless stranger. "And meanwhile, I'll die a little bit more every day, watching."<p>

"No. You won't care by then," Clary's voice was flat, robotic. "Please. If we don't say anything—if we just pretend—"

"There is no pretending," Jace said confidently. It was the only thing he could be confident about. He needed to say the words, needed to get them out. He'd be okay with dying after that, as long as she knew the truth. "I love you, and I will love you until I die, and if there's a life after that, I'll love you then."

Jace vaguely heard Clary draw her breath in, as if she was astonished at his words. In truth, she should've known all along. But he ploughed on, his words starting to become jumbled. "And I know you think I just want to be with you to—to show myself what a monster I am," Jace said, meeting her gaze firmly. "And maybe I _am_ a monster. I don't know the answer to that. But what I do know is that even if there's demon blood inside me, there _is _human blood inside me as well. And I couldn't love you like I do if I wasn't at least a little bit human. Because demons want. But they don't love. And I—"

Jace bolted up, and crossed over to the window. _And I love you like I shouldn't. I love you more than anything in the world_, _and there's nothing I can do about it, because I love you enough to sacrifice the world to keep you alive and Heaven knows that's not going to go away anytime soon._

"Jace?" Clary asked him, alarm lacing her voice. Jace stayed silent, and Clary hurried over to him, placing a hand on his shoulder. Her touch burned his shoulder. "What's wrong?"

"I shouldn't have told you like that," Jace said tensely, and he couldn't look at her. Not yet. (Probably not ever.) "I'm sorry. That was probably a lot to take in. You looked so…shocked."

"I was," Clary confirmed, looking up at him. "I've spent the past few days wondering if you hated me. And then I saw you tonight and I was pretty sure you did."

"Hated you?" Jace repeated dumbly. This was when he looked at her, and saw the hurt across her pretty features. He reached out a hand and brushed the tips of his fingers across her face lightly. He felt that telltale spark run through his fingertips that he always got when he touched Clary, and wondered idly if it would ever go away. _Him _hate _her_? "I told you I couldn't sleep. Tomorrow by midnight we'll be either at war or under Valentine's rule. This could be the last night of our lives, certainly the last even barely ordinary one. The last night we go to sleep and get up just as we always have. And all I could think of was that I wanted to spend it with you."

Clary's eyes widened, and Jace belatedly realized the implications of his words. "Jace—"

"I don't mean it like that," he said. "I won't touch you, not if you don't want me to. I  
>know it's wrong—God, it's all kinds of wrong—but I just want to lie down with you and<br>wake up with you, just once, just once ever in my life," he said desperately. _This is it. This is my only chance to spend a night, and wake up beside her. I could die— hell, there's actually a fairly good chance I will— and I might never see her again._ "It's just this one night. In the grand scheme of things, how much can one night matter?"

Clary looked as if she was torn, and didn't respond. _She's about to say no—_

"Close the curtains, then, before you come to bed," Clary spoke, and a sad half smile curled onto her lips. "I can't sleep with this much light in the room."

Jace had never really expected for Clary to agree to this. He'd thought that he'd have to beg her, or something of that sort for her to even consider it. He smiled a smile that he hadn't smiled for weeks, and wrapped his arms around Clary, burying his face in her tangled curls.

"Come to bed," Clary repeated softly to him as she pulled away and crawled back into her bed. "It's late."

Jace jerked the curtains closed, and took off his mourning jacket and placed it on the back of the chair. He unbuckled his weapons belt and took off his shoes before walking towards the bed and lying down beside Clary.

Lying down beside Clary felt natural to Jace, almost as if this were what he was supposed to be doing. He turned his head to look at the redhead lying beside him; he could just make out her face in the darkness. "Good night, Clary," He said softly, and shut his eyes. His arms lay flat at his sides, though he still yearned to reach over and touch Clary's hand.

Clary seemed to be in the same predicament, because a second later, she slid her hand over beside Jace's so their fingertips just touched. That spark was there again—this time, it was more powerful, a thousand times more potent.

Jace knew Clary was watching him, and he smiled. His mouth curled into a smile just as Clary interlaced their fingers. "Good night," she whispered, closing her eyes.

_If only I could do this forever_, he thought wistfully as she drifted off into sleep beside him. So instead of sleeping, he watched her. He shouldn't have, really—he'd be overtired when he went to kill Sebastian, and it would be harder to fight him. But he did, all night, right until the sun came up. Until he knew that he had to get up and leave.

Jace got out of the bed cautiously, being careful not to wake up Clary. He looked around groggily, and smiled when he spotted a pen on Clary's bedside table and some paper by the chair.

_I'll write her a letter to tell her all the things I wish I could have said, _he thought, sadness tainting the words in his head. And then he picked up the pen, went over to the chair and started to write.

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><p><em>Clary,<em>

_Despite everything, I can't bear the thought of this ring being lost forever, any more than I can bear the thought of leaving you forever. And though I have no choice about the one, at least I can choose about the other._

_I'm leaving you the family ring because you have as much right to it as I do._

_I'm writing this watching the sun come up. You're asleep, dreams moving beneath your restless eyelids. I wish I knew what you were thinking. I wish I could slip inside your head and see the world the way you do. I wish I could see _myself _the way you do. But maybe I don't want to see that. Maybe it would make me feel even more than I already do that I'm perpetuating some kind of Great Lie on you, and I can't stand that._

_I belong to you. You could do anything you wanted with me and I'd let you. You could ask anything of me and I'd break myself trying to make you happy. My heart tells me this is the best and greatest feeling that I've ever had. But my mind knows the difference between wanting what you can't have and wanting what you shouldn't want. And I shouldn't want you._

_All night I've watched you sleeping, watched the moonlight come and go, casting its shadows across your face in black and white. I've never seen anything more beautiful. I think of the life we would have had, if things were different, a life where this night is not a singular event separated by everything that's real, but every night. But things aren't different, and I can't look at you without feeling that I've tricked you into loving me._

_The truth no one is willing to say out loud is that no one has a shot against Valentine but me. I can get close to him like no one else can. I can pretend that I want to join him and he'll believe me, up until that last moment where I end it all, one way or another. I have something of Sebastian's; I can Track him to where my father's hiding, and that's what I'll do. So I lied to you last night. I told you I just wanted one night with you. But I want every night. And that's why I have to slip out of your window now, like a coward._

_Because if I had to tell you this to your face, I couldn't make myself go._

_I don't blame you if you hate me, I wish you would. As long as I can still dream, I will dream of you._

—_Jace_

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><p>Jace got up and read the letter over. It said everything that needed to be said, and Clary could handle it. She was strong, stronger than most people realized. She'd be fine—maybe not right away, but eventually. She'd still be able to live her life, to marry that faceless stranger. Besides, Jace never really thought that he'd get a life with her anyways.<p>

He got up noiselessly and placed the letter onto Clary's bedside table. Jace looked down at her sleeping figure. _Will I ever see her again?_

_I don't know, but I'll fight to stay alive just so I can._

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><p><strong>P.S. I LIKE REVIEWS!<strong>

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	12. Finally, Happiness (EDITED)

**A/N: Hello! I'm updating two days early because I'm going to be away next week and I won't be able to update for a while. And I didn't want you to wait for the last re-update/edit of_ Moments_! I hope you all enjoy it :)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own the _Mortal Instruments_ series or any of its characters, settings, or plots. Nor am I Cassandra Clare.  
><strong>

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><p><em><strong>for chapter 11:<strong>_

**to the ticking clock: Daww, thanks! :3 Your reviews make me feel all fuzzy inside, I'll miss you :)**

**to To Love Is To Destroy: Thank you! You've been on this story since the beginning... thank you so much! I'll miss you and your reviews!**

**to dianscot: I sort of get where you're coming from, but I respectfully disagree. While I personally don't think that Jace expected to die, I do think that he realized that it was a very possible outcome. So yeah. (Also, thank you so much for your feedback. I like that you gave me some constructive criticism so I knew what to improve on.)**

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><p><em><strong>for chapter 12:<strong>_

**to VeniVediVici: Thank you! And yes, the angst :(**

**to the ticking clock: Thank you so much! You're waaaay too kind. I'm smiling goofily at my computer now, it's kind of disturbing. :)**

**to Xxdazzled by twilightxX: Thanks for all of your reviews! And yes, _The Hunger Games_ trilogy is super cool. I'm really really excited for _Mockingjay_. The trailer was WAY TOO PERFECT AND TOO MUCH FOR MY FEELS (sorry for caplocking, it happens sometimes).**

**BAmbi Magenta ANn: Haha, thanks! Don't worry, I am quite fond of food in general (especially chocolately items) so that was a really nice compliment. :)**

**to To Love Is To Destroy: Thank you (again)! This is my favourite chapter, too (and I'm also a sucker for happy endings).**

**to bookworm116: Thanks! You can check out my profile for more stories if you want :)**

**to Clessa Winters: Me too! Thank so much for being super rad and just generally awesome and cool. Oh, and you should check out the author's note at the end.**

**to vampchick09: Thank you! Yeah, that scene would've been a good one to write, but I just didn't want to get into all the angst after CoG. Sorry :/**

**to DorkQueen: Thank you so much! :) Sorry about the formatting thing. I hope that it's fixed now.**

**to SpainBooks: Thanks!**

**to ughmanda: Thank you so much! (also, further dedication below)**

**to Guest: Thanks!**

**to dianscot: Thank you! I put in a little more Jace this time. I hope you like it. :)**

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><p>Jace felt like smiling, crying, laughing, and yelling all at once. He'd just found out that he wasn't Clary's brother, and he didn't have demon blood, either. He could finally give into that half-repressed longing that he'd had since just before he met her; last night could be repeated dozens upon dozens of times—maybe even hundreds of times. The very thought made his head spin wonderfully.<p>

Of course, there were some cons to the situation: Max, the innocent little brother that Jace'd never had, was dead, and Clary, his not-sister, was bleeding and bound on the ground. And then there was Valentine, Jace's not-really father. The older man was in front of him, and Jace had the tip of his sword against Valentine's chest.

"_Last words," _Jace hissed, staring down unforgivingly at the man that had brought him up, the man that had fooled him into thinking that Clary was his sister. The man that he now hated with every fiber of his being. "What are they?"

Valentine raised his head and looked at Jace as if he was looking at a close friend's casket. His eyes were somber, as if he was about to do a horrible something against Jace, and truly didn't want to. _Right_, Jace thought sarcastically. _Like he's ever cared._ "I'm sorry," Valentine whispered. "I am so sorry."

Valentine stretched out his hand toward Jace. At first, Jace thought Valentine meant to touch him, but then his adoptive father turned his hand palm up. He remembered seeing Magnus do the same thing when summoning an object, and realized belatedly what Valentine was about to do. But there was no time to think before the sword was in the other man's hands and he was thrusting it into Jace's heart.

When Jace looked down, he could see Maellartach sticking out of his chest grotesquely, like a real life Pablo Picasso, abstract and foreign. It didn't register for a few moments—Jace could see the blood and the gaping hole in the fabric of his shirt and feel the pain searing through his body, but it was all as if he were watching from someone else's point of view.

Valentine abruptly jerked the Sword out of Jace's torso, and a wave of fresh pain went through Jace. Without meaning to, without being able to stop, he fell to his knees on the beach, his sword falling out of his hand and onto the sandy banks of Lake Lyn. In that dazed state of someone slipping from consciousness, he looked down at himself and wondered what happened, what had gone wrong. He'd had Valentine trapped, for God's sake. How'd he gotten the upper hand?

And then there was Clary. All those hopeful dreams Jace had had about being able to spend the rest of his life with her had just vanished and turned hopeless, a faraway vision. He'd never be able to look at her and not feel guilt, to kiss her and just enjoy it, to just be around her and not feel a kind of resigned bitterness. Having them be a possibility and then torn away from him was almost more painful than the sword wound.

Clary might not know that Jace wasn't her brother. If Jace were to die right here and now, she might never know it, and forever wistfully dream about what could have been. Sure, Clary was strong and she _would _get better, but she would be devastated. And Jace couldn't—wouldn't—do that to her.

So Jace opened his mouth to speak to her, to say those words. To tell Clary that he loved her, maybe, or that she wasn't his sister. To tell her not to waste time in sorrow, to move on from him and continue her life after he was dead. (Or better yet, try to forget him entirely.)

But the only thing that came out was blood before Jace succumbed to the darkness and died.

* * *

><p>The moment Jace re-awoke to darkness, he knew he was dead. He couldn't see himself and when his arm passed over where his torso should be, he felt only empty air. Guilt swallowed him. He'd left the others behind: Isabelle, Alec, Maryse, Robert, Clary—<em>Clary<em>—and even Luke. They'd miss him. And it wasn't just that they'd miss him—he'd failed them. Valentine would be taking over Idris now. Jace had failed in killing his adopted father, and because of him, the world would be forever changed.

Somewhere in the midst of his grief, a familiar voice spoke out. "Jace," Clary's voice whispered. "Jace."

And he felt a pull in his gut, and before he knew it, the world was spinning.

* * *

><p>When Jace opened his eyes again, he wasn't in the shadows anymore. He was back on the shores of Lake Lyn, and Clary was lying a few yards away from him, her clothes soaked and torn and her body grimy and covered in blood (but still the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen).<p>

Was this heaven? _No, _he answered himself a second later, mentally snorting at himself. _Like I'd land in Heaven. _But Clary was there, so how could it be Hell? Cautiously, he scrambled up and walked shakily over to Clary, his pulse hammering in his ears.

Jace knelt down beside her when he reached her, leaning over her body with growing concern. Her eyes were closed, and she wasn't moving. But her chest was still rising and falling; she was alive.

_Clary's alive, _he thought, a slow relief sweeping through him. He almost laughed._ I'm alive; we made it. Those nights… seem more of an option now._

Jace leaned over her further so that his body was hovering over hers. He was barely aware of whispering Clary's name, but let the words slip out willingly. "Clary," he whispered softly, and he heard the overwhelming relief that he felt lacing through his voice. "Clary. Clary. Clary."

But Clary still wouldn't open her green eyes, and Jace needed to see her beautiful eyes, to make sure she was alive. "Clary," he said, more urgently. "Open your eyes."

And Clary did, and he saw her eyelashes flutter and her eyes hesitantly open. He saw those eyes, the ones that shone with so much affection, latch onto his. When she saw him, her soft lips parted into an _o. _Jace saw Clary look over him and drink him in, she saw her look turn from affection to hopeful to surprise, and finally, to happiness.

"You're alive," she whispered, looking at him like she was a Shadowhunter who'd just gotten their first weapon, joy overtaking her features. "Really alive."

_And we are alive. We're alive, and Valentine's gone. We can live again, and I can finally be with Clary.._. Jace reached down to touch her face, brushing his thumb over her cheek gently. _We're alive._ "I was in the dark," he started softly, a corner of his mouth turning up despite himself. "There was nothing there but shadows, and I was a shadow, and I knew that I was dead and that it was over, all of it. And then I heard your voice. I heard you say my name, and it brought me back."

"Not me," she said hoarsely, staring up at him as if transfixed. "The Angel brought you back."

"Because you asked him to." Jace traced Clary's face with the tips of his fingers, starting at her temple and running softly down her cheek until he was tracing the outline of her lips. "You could have had anything else in the world, and you asked for me."

Clary smiled up at Jace, and it struck him. _When Raziel gave Clary a wish, she could have chosen anything. But… she chose me._ "But I don't want anything else in the world."

And Jace knew he'd never felt this happy, this carefree. He still couldn't believe that he wasn't Clary's brother… "You're not my brother," Clary said. The words tumbled out of her mouth as if she couldn't wait to get them out. "You know that, right?"

Jace grinned down at her. "Yes," he told her softly, joy taking up his voice. "I know that."

* * *

><p>There were about a million different questions going through Jace's head. So many things had changed, for better and for worse, that he wasn't sure if they were all real. He held his father's box in his hands. The bird designs on the silver of it seemed to be familiar to him but at the same time distant.<p>

So Jace was a Herondale. Not a Morgenstern with demon blood, and not a Wayland. He was a Herondale. _But am I really a Herondale if I've never met my parents, and never even known who they were? _He mused, tapping his fingers against the wooden box. That there was the question, the one that had been bugging him ever since he'd recovered and could think anything other than _Clary's not my sister. We're not siblings._

And speak or think of the devil and she shall appear, apparently. Catching a flicker of orange hair in his peripheral vision, Jace looked up. Sure enough, there was Clary, standing unsurely by a pillar a short distance away.

His breath caught in his throat at the sight of her. Clary was dressed up in a sleeveless silver dress that made her look even more beautiful than normal, hugging her subtle curves in all the right places. Her freckled shoulders were bare, and her hair was down just the way Jace liked it, free and curling wildly like licks of fire. Someone, probably Isabelle, had put makeup on her; her green eyes were lined in gold, making them stand out even more. _I might have to thank Izzy later, _he thought distractedly.

Even in his sleep-deprived state, Jace felt his heart beat even faster just by looking at her. Overall, she reminded him of that display in a shop one could look at but couldn't touch, like a precious necklace, something delicate and sacred.

"Clary?" he asked softly, wondering if it actually was her. (After all, Jace didn't think she would ever wear something this girly willingly.)

"Who else would it be?" Clary retorted, smiling slightly. It was her voice, all right. But even with proof, it was hard to reconcile the usual Clary with the siren standing in front of him.

"You don't look like you."

"It's the dress," Clary answered, running a hand over the silky material self-consciously. "I don't usually wear things this…pretty."

"You always look beautiful," he said automatically. It was true, and now that they weren't siblings, he could say it all he wanted (and he wanted to say it a _lot_). "But you look—distant. Like I couldn't touch you."

Clary walked over and sat next to him. Though the step he was perched on was wide, she was sitting close enough that their thighs brushed. He watched as she held her hand out, noticing that it was trembling slightly. "Touch me," she said softly, looking straight into Jace's eyes. Her words brought fire into his veins. "If you want to."

And so Jace did. He took her hand and rested his cheek for only a moment. He had barely felt that spark he felt whenever he touched Clary before he forced himself to drop it back into her lap. Clary shivered a little, and Jace had an inkling that it wasn't because of the cold. "What's in the box?" she asked him quietly.

"I went to Amatis's earlier today, looking for you," he told her. "But you weren't there. So I talked to Amatis. She gave me this." He gestured to the box. "It belonged to my father."

Clary briefly looked at the box, and it looked as if she was wondering why Valentine would have a box like this. But then her expression cleared, and she smiled up at him. "Of course," she responded, her shoulders relaxing slightly. "Amatis was married to Stephen Herondale."

"I've been going through it," Jace said, looking down at the box with a kind of exhausted sadness. "Reading the letters and the journal pages. I thought if I did that, I might feel some sort of connection to him. Something that would leap off the pages at me, saying _yes, this is your father. _But I don't feel anything. Just bits of paper. Anyone could have written these things."

"Jace," Clary started softly, placing a hand on his arm.

But Jace plowed on. "And that's another thing," he continued, glancing at her subtly. "I don't have a name anymore, do I? I'm not Jonathan Christopher—that was someone else. But it's the name I'm used to."

"Who came up with Jace as a nickname? Did you come up with it yourself?"

Jace shook his head slightly. "No. Valentine always called me Jonathan. And that's what they called me when I first got to the Institute. I was never supposed to think my name was Jonathan Christopher, you know—that was an accident. I got the name out of my father's journal, but it wasn't me he was talking about. It wasn't my progress he was recording. It was Seb—it was Jonathan's. So the first time I ever told Maryse that my middle name was Christopher, she told herself that she'd just remembered wrong, and Christopher had been Michael's son's middle name. It had been ten years, after all. But that was when she started calling me Jace: It was like she wanted to give me a new name, something that belonged to her, to my life in New York. And I liked it. I'd never liked Jonathan," he answered, the corner of his mouth turning up. "I wonder if maybe Maryse knew, or guessed, but just didn't want to know. She loved me…and she didn't want to believe it."

"Which is why she was so upset when she found out you _were _Valentine's son," Clary realized, looking up at him. "Because she thought she ought to have known. She kind of _did _know. But we never do want to believe things like that about people we love. And, Jace, she was right about you. She was right about who you really are. And you _do _have a name. Your name is Jace. Valentine didn't give that name to you. Maryse did. The only thing that makes a name important, and yours, is that it's given to you by someone who loves you."

"Jace what?" he asked again, honestly being anxious for possibly the first time in his life. "Jace Herondale?"

"Oh, please," Clary said, as if the answer were ridiculously obvious. "You're Jace _Lightwood. _You know that." (And it kind of was, once she'd said it.)

Jace looked at her and met her eyes, holding her gaze as she continued. "Maybe you're a different person than you thought you were," she told him. "But no one becomes a totally different person overnight. Just finding out that Stephen was your biological father isn't going to automatically make you love him. And you don't have to. Valentine wasn't your real father, but not because you don't have his blood in your veins. He wasn't your real father because he didn't _act _like a father. He didn't take care of you. It's always been the Lightwoods who have taken care of you. _They're _your family. Just like Mom and Luke are mine." Clary reached over to Jace as if she were about to touch him, but then pulled her hand back sharply. "I'm sorry," she said. "Here I am lecturing you, and you probably came up here to be alone."

"You're right," Jace said. Valentine was as much a father to Jace as Stephen was, though Jace knew the comparison was not very nice.

Unfortunately, he'd said his words unthinkingly. Clary looked as if she had swallowed a bite of Isabelle's cooking. "All right, then. I'll go." She stood up hurriedly and nearly tripped on her dress.

"Clary!" _Damn it, now I've offended her. Nice job, Jace. _He set the box down and hastily got to his feet. "Clary, wait. That wasn't what I meant. I didn't mean I wanted to be alone. I meant you were right about Valentine—about the Lightwoods—"

Clary turned around and looked at him again. Her expression was slightly wistful and sad. "You know," she spoke, smiling slightly. "Aline said maybe you wouldn't be interested anymore. Now that it _isn't _forbidden. Now that you could be with me if you wanted to." Clary shivered minutely, and hugged her elbows to her chest. "Is that true? Are you not…interested?"

Jace almost laughed. _Interested_? He'd always be interested, even when/if they made it into their eighties and were wrinkly and old. "_Interested? _As if you were a—a book, or a piece of news? No, I'm not _interested_. I'm—" Jace broke off, searching for the right word to describe his feelings for Clary and finding none. "Do you remember what I said to you before? About feeling like the fact that you were my sister was a sort of cosmic joke on me? On both of us?"

"I remember."

"I never believed it," Jace told her, then backtracked. "I mean, I believed it in a way—I let it drive me to despair, but I never _felt _it. Never felt you were my sister. Because I didn't feel about you the way you're supposed to feel about your sister. But that didn't mean I didn't feel like you were a part of me. I've always felt that." Jace caught sight of her confused expression and broke off with an impatient sigh. "I'm not saying this right. Clary, I hated every second that I thought you were my sister. I hated every moment that I thought what I felt for you meant there was something wrong with me. But—"

"But _what_?" Clary looked breathless, staring at him intently.

"I could see the delight Valentine took in the way I felt about you. The way you felt about me. He used it as a weapon against us. And that made me hate him. More than anything else he'd ever done to me, that made me hate him, and it made me turn against him, and maybe that's what I needed to do. Because there were times I didn't know if I wanted to follow him or not. It was a hard choice—harder than I like to remember." His throat constricted painfully at just the mere memory.

"I asked you if I had a choice once," Clary reminded Jace firmly. "And you said, 'We always have choices.' You chose against Valentine. In the end that was the choice you made, and it doesn't matter how hard it was to make it. It matters that you did."

"I know," Jace told her quietly. "I'm just saying that I think I chose the way I did in part because of you. Since I've met you, everything I've done has been in part because of you. I can't untie myself from you, Clary— not my heart or my blood or my mind or any other part of me. And I don't want to."

"You don't?" Clary asked, looking so hopeful Jace almost smiled.

Jace stepped towards her, and looked her deep in the eyes. "I always thought love made you stupid. Made you weak. A bad Shadowhunter. _To love is to destroy. _I believed that."

Clary bit her lip, but wouldn't—or _couldn't_—look away. "I used to think being a good warrior meant not caring," He continued. "About anything, myself especially. I took every risk I could. I flung myself in the path of demons. I think I gave Alec a complex about what kind of fighter he was, just because he wanted to live." Jace smiled at Clary crookedly. "And then I met you. You were a mundane. Weak. Not a fighter. Never trained. And then I saw how much you loved your mother, loved Simon, and how you'd walk into hell to save them. You _did _walk into that vampire hotel. Shadowhunters with a decade of experience wouldn't have tried that. Love didn't make you weak; it made you stronger than anyone I'd ever met. And I realized I was the one who was weak."

"_No_," Clary said, sounding thoroughly taken aback. Her eyes widened and she stepped closer. "You're not."

"Maybe not anymore," Jace allowed, stepping close enough that if he wanted to, he could grab her around the waist and kiss her (and he wanted to). Somehow, he managed to suppress the urge. "Valentine couldn't believe I'd killed Jonathan. Couldn't believe it because I was the weak one, and Jonathan was the one with more training. By all rights, he probably should have killed me. He nearly did. But I thought of _you_—I saw you there, clearly, as if you were standing in front of me, watching me, and I knew I wanted to live, wanted it more than I'd ever wanted anything, if only so that I could see your face one more time."

Clary still looked stunned, and Jace continued. "And now I'm looking at you," he said, and shook his head in amusement. _Interested? _"And you're asking me if I still want you, as if I could stop loving you. As if I would want to give up the thing that makes me stronger than anything else ever has. I never dared give much of myself to anyone before—bits of myself to the Lightwoods, to Isabelle and Alec, but it took years to do it—but, Clary, since the first time I saw you, I have belonged to you completely. I still do. If you want me."

Clary still looked frozen. Then suddenly she was reaching for him and fisting her hands in the front of his shirt, using them to pull him towards her. Jace would have laughed if he'd had the time, but as soon as he had his arms around her they were kissing and it was the best feeling in the world.

That spark came back, a hundred times more powerful. All Jace knew about was Clary, and that her mouth was on his and they were kissing. A demon could have snuck up on them and Jace wouldn't have known, because for once in his life, he forgot about the world. He let everything go, and focused on Clary, just Clary and him and the feel of his mouth on hers and his hands in her hair.

After what seemed like only a few seconds but was probably a minute or two, Jace pulled away from Clary. She gasped in air as soon as they'd parted, her cheeks flushed. Belatedly, Jace realized that they'd both forgotten to breathe. Oops.

He cupped her face between his hands, brushing his thumbs over her cheekbones. "There," he said softly, feeling happier than ever. "That wasn't so bad, was it, even though it wasn't forbidden?"

"I've had worse," Clary retorted breathlessly, laughing somewhat shakily.

"You know," Jace told her, and bent over to brush his lips across hers lightly. "If it's the lack of _forbidden _you're worried about, you could still forbid me to do things."

"What kinds of things?" Clary asked curiously.

Jace smiled devilishly against Clary's mouth. "Things like this."

* * *

><p><strong>Also, a few last thank yous. First, to my loyal followers: the ticking clock, To Love Is To Destroy, BAmbi Magenta ANn, vampchick09, DorkQueen, VeniVediVici, Xxdazzled by twilightxX, and dianscot. There's a spot in my heart for all of you wonderful people. :)<strong>

**Secondly, to Amanda (aka ughmanda), who has become a fan of my work on here and a friend of mine on tumblr and twitter. (And also for being super cool and having a great taste in bands.) Thank you so much!**

**Thirdly, to my best internet friend Clessa Winters. She's a great writer (go follow her on Wattpad!), and she's been so nice to me. Thank you from the depths of my heart for all your support.**

**Fourthly, to everyone who ever read, favourited, reviewed, or followed any of my stories. I started writing fanfictions just over a year ago, and I am deeply grateful to you all. Thank you _so _much.**

**Thank you all.**

**Love,**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


	13. CHAPTER 12 IS UP!

**_CHAPTER 12 (THE LAST CHAPTER) IS NOW UP. PLEASE GO READ IT, LOVELIES._**

**~Alex (aka dontforget2live) :) x**


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